Company Response Review Report Review
Safe-Direct is a Broker

Christopher Eng Submitted this review about Ship a Car Direct
Review made Live: 3/24/2013 8:19:00 AM
My car went from Southern California to Fort Dix, New Jersey.
Estimated shipping costs from various companies ranged from $740-$1050. Most carriers offer door-to-door shipping. This company is a broker only, and they explain the breakdown of costs well on their website with videos. I paid $225 for broker services, and $600 paid directly to the carrier.

The broker explains that my request for transport is put on a central dispatch website as a bid that the carriers can choose to accept or not. My order got picked up by a carrier right away, and I got a chance to research the reputation of that carrier. When I saw that the carrier had a poor reputation, and after talking with the carrier, I felt that I needed to change to a new carrier.

Safe-Direct was fine with me rejecting the first carrier, and put my order back up on central dispatch, to wait for carriers to pick me up. Over the weekend, it seems most brokers and carriers aren't picking up new orders. As I was running out of time to get my car shipped, I went with the next carrier that picked me up, even though this 2nd carrier also had a limited/poor reputation. The good thing was that this carrier was based at the destination area in New Jersey. I'm not sure if that really matters, but in this case, it turned out well for me.

This 2nd carrier arrived for pickup on the day he said, but arrived at 6am, when I thought we had agreed on 8am. He blew up my phone for about an hour, and was about to leave. Luckily he stayed for that hour or I would have had to find a 3rd carrier.

My car is about 12 years old, so it has some dents and scratches, but when this carrier started filling out the bill of lading, he put big X-marks all over the picture of the car, rather than specific areas of the car. In the end, I had a bit of paint scraped off near my passenger mirror, probably due to some straps flapping in the wind during transport, but I couldn't complain about it because of the blanked X-marks on the bill of lading. If my car were newer, I would have been more scrutinizing on that form.

In general, the broker assigned me a random carrier that I would not have otherwise been able to find on my own. The carriers are usually no-nonsense types of blue-collar guys who routinely travel certain long distance routes. I feel like I paid a lot for the broker fees, but it's somewhat nice to have a broker who can talk to carriers for me. Next time I may spend the time to research carriers on my own. I am fortunate this time because the carrier said that if I help advise his daughter on how to get into the Army/FBI, he will transport my car back to California for free.
Shipment Details
Origin State:
California
Pickup:
On Time
Destination State:
New Jersey
Delivery:
On Time
Customer Service
Honesty:
Knowlegeable:
Promptness:
Customer Service:
Review Details
Quote or Order Id:
295678-ER
Quote or Order Cost:
$825

Car Condition
  • Vehicle was dirty
Company Response
Michael Strickland from Ship a Car Direct Submitted this response.
Response Date: 3/26/2013 7:54:00 PM
Thanks for your feedback, Christopher. You are right - we are up-front about being a broker. Most drivers don't have office hours so they need to go through brokers to handle some of the customer service. We make sure that the carriers are fully licensed and insured and have excellent industry ratings. We are always happy to explain the vetting process. I'm glad you made a good personal connection with your driver!