Metropolitan Moving & Storage Corp

They gouged our newly refinished floors. Damaged furniture. Tore the finish off a few other pieces of furniture by putting packing tape directly onto them. Banged the crap out of the walls. It was the worst moving experience we’ve ever had, and we’re left holding the bag on very expensive damage.

This company canceled on me at 4:35 the day before they were supposed to move furniture from my mom’s apartment (she died at the end of the previous month) to storage. Their excuse was that they had transmission problems with their only truck. I noticed that their contract said there was a $ 95 charge for cancellation, but they didn’t offer me anything, not even the name and phone number of other movers. I did ask, but the person that canceled never called back with anyone else’s name.

I had an awful experience with Metropolitan Moving and Storage. Movers showed up more than an hour late. They took 10 hours to move a 3 bedroom townhouse. The movers did not show up with enough materials or a truck that was big enough. The movers had to be reminded that they were supposed to be moving things. Howard the owner was very rude on the phone. I will never use or recommend this company again.

This was the ABSOLUTE WORST moving company that I’ve ever used. First their truck infested my belongings with BedBugs. And when I contacted the owner/​manager Howard about the situation. He was extremely rude & later had one of his employees named Bill contact me telling me that I wouldn’t have to pay & that he would handle the cost of the move for me. By the next week they still charged the $ 240.00 on my debit card plus the $ 50.00 deposit that was never returned back to my card. And when I tried to contact the owner Howard about the changes he never answered my calls. I am now waiting for the Illinois Attorney General’s office to process all my paperwork from both landlords stating that there weren’t any Bedbugs in either apartment, and my doctor’s note stating that the swollen marks on my neck were in fact bug bite & that I had an allergic reaction to their bites.
HANDS DOWN WORST MOVING COMPANY & OWNER EVER!!! I wish I could give this company a –5 stars.

My daughter & I had a wonderful experience with Metropolitan Moving and its owner Howard. Howard went out of his way to make my daughter’s move from one apt. to another seamless. I originally chose his moving company b/​c of its BBB rating & the fact that Howard was honest about time and pricing, returned everyone of my phone calls, & gave us tips on how to make the move better. I am out of state & wanted to make sure my daughter was set for her move. Howard understood our circumstances and went out of his way to accommodate. I called numerous movers in the Chicago area, and Howard was the only one to have reasonable pricing, a positive attitude and to return my calls in a timely fashion. I highly recommend Metropolitan Movers & will definitely use them again. Thank you Howard!

I unfortunately had to use this company twice. They gave me free storage, since we were moving out of one place and not moving to the other for 2 months. The first move went ok but Howard the owner did forget to mention that they would charge us 75% of the charge to move our stuff into storage. They took their time to wrap everything so that this charge would go up and up even though we argued and said that there is no way it will take them 3 hours to move it since there is no stairs and nothing needs to be wrapped… he didn’t budge.
On the second move, After the fact I started unpacking and noticed that every single one of my very nice plates was broken. I called Howard and asked if there was something he can do. He said that since they didn’t pack it they weren’t liable. I made the argument that even the very fragile wine glasses made it fine. He basically told me where I can go.
Basically the guys were good and did a fine job, the owner is the one that is ruining their business!
Do not use this company unless you want to deal with an owner that didn’t care about satisfied customers and about coming the right thing.
If you have about an hour to kill feel free to give them a call and hear about hiw all the other moving companies have hidden fees. If any pertinant information is given it’ll be about thirty minutes in after you have put the phone down from bordem.

Metro moving moved my mother-​in-​law from a 2 bedroom to a 1 bedroom after her husband passed and I must say, she & I were very impressed with the quality, attention to detail (they wrapped everything) and efficiency of their movers. 2 great guys, who also helped us finish packing, when they arrived. They knew how to divide & conquer. While one guy packed & wrapped what was left unpacked, the other guy started wrapping & loading the truck with the boxes that were already packed. Thanks again for making this transition so easy for our family.

I had a great experience with Metropolitan. They showed up on time. I wasn’t quite done packing because I had a newborn baby and it was harder finding time to pack than I had anticipated.
They were nice, the guys worked hard and worked non stop. I bought everyone Burger King and bottled water since it was so much work.
It took a while but I have a lot of stuff. Three guys loaded the truck up.
They moved me to North Carolina.
Two guys unloaded me and it was quick as heck.
They weren’t the cheapest but they were not the most expensive either. Plus they gave me great perks like free boxes which they delivered to me.
Over all, I think they did a great job. I move yearly and have used quite a few movers in Chicago.
I plan on using them again.

I just moved in June 2011. As stated in previous reviews, at the beginning Howard was very professional. I had very little and told Howard everything I was moving, including boxes and indicated it shouldn’t take more than 3 – 4 hours at the most. I was moving from West Loop to Edgewater. While I understood that trucks cannot drive on LSD, it still isn’t that far away. It took the crew hours to move me out, more than an hour to get to my new place, and hours to deliver my goods. At the end they wanted to charge me for 7.5 hours. Are you kidding? Of course, I paid what I thought was appropriate. NEVER NEVER use this company. They are a rip off.

this is my complaint with the BBB about this company. I think it pretty much sums things up:
Consumer’s Original Complaint :
I was set to move on July 1^st, 2011 and seeked help from Metropolitan Movers. I was speaking with a man named Howard who I believe is the owner/​manager. He seemed very accommodating and professional when I was initially setting up my move with him. He told me that they had a 9 am move the morning of the first and that they should be with me any time between 12pm and 2 pm depending on how long the previous move took. No problem.
Well, when the day came I hadn’t heard from anyone so around 12pm I called Howard to see if he could give me a more specific time when the movers would arrive. He then told me that they had gotten a little delayed due to a rain storm (mind you it never rained in the city that day) and they should probably arrive around 2:30. Well, 2:30 rolls around and they still are nowhere to be found. After going back and forth every 15 – 30 minutes for HOURS And being lied to repeatedly about the location of my movers, I had run out of time for my elevator (which I had from 12−5pm!!!).
Around 4:30pm My mother called Howard and he was incredibly unprofessional and downright rude, swearing and hanging up on her. After my mother guilted him for about an hour he offered to send the movers for free to at least move my big furniture. When they finally showed up at 5:30 PM it was far too late and they were in a RENTAL TRUCK. It was an offensive joke.
In they end I had to delay my move 5 days and pay my previous landlord for te extra week that my stuff was there for not to mention having to go through the process of hiring other movers (Two Men and a Truck. and they were great) last minute. Ridiculous!
Update 8/​29, 2011: Howard called me after being notified if my BBB complaint. He offered to pay me off at $ 150.00 if I took my complain off the site (supposedly what the move would have cost him for employees, supplies, etc). I removed the complaint as soon as we finished our conversation and was promised a check by Friday. Due to some elaborate excuse my check was delayed. I waited and waited for the check or some sort of contact. A month later and I have yet to see anything. Therefore, up my review remains.

Very pleasant and knowledgeable. Would recommend you to any of my friends and family.

Well I didn’t check in a week later like I said, but my friend is looking for a mover and I just referred her to these guys today.
My move went EXTREMELY well. They were very fast like last time, the manager said he probably had the guys still on staff that I used in ’06 but we couldn’t figure out who they were so I got 3 new guys. They were super fast and efficient. They used the straps again and were zipping all over the place. They came in about an hour under the estimate and we gave them a hefty tip. These guys had a bit more personality than the last crew, not that it matters.
I took some pictures, I’ll see if I can figure out how to post them…
Use these movers! You’ll be glad you did.

DO NOT USE Metropolitan Moving and Storage. This firm is now at a different location, but horrible service. It took them 7 ½ hours to move me from the western part of Lincoln Park to the eastern part of Oak Park with 3 guys. It took them 4 ½ hours to take my things out of my condo. I had everything besides my furniture in 9 boxes, so it should have taken them about 60 – 90 minutes to do it. Plus, when they got to the new location, they got there 40 minutes after me, although we left at the same time and trip was less than half an hour. They were able to unlaod in about 2 hours, but that is because they were coming to the end of the day and wanted to be done. They did the tip conversation with me at the beginning that they worked on tips and I was stupid enough to actually give them a decent tip.
One thing in their defense, none of my stuff was ever going to get scratched up as it was wrapped up 4 – 5 times so they could get higher fees as they charged by the hour.
Therefore, do not use this firm.

We scheduled our move weeks in advance and had a company representative come out to survey our move and estimate costs for us. He was very professional and we chose this company based on that experience.
Fast forward to the day of the move. Nightmare! Movers were 20 minutes late, not so big of a deal to me that day, we had all day and no rush, but rain was in the forecast so I was just a tiny bit anxious.
They sent three guys, which we knew ahead of time, so we were excited this would be a quick and painless move. Not so much. All three guys were drunk, or had been drunk within the last 12 hours for sure — the smell of booze and cigarettes poured from their bodies. Before the work began, they mentioned to us that for a job like this, they typically get tipped beyween $ 60 and $ 80 per person. Sorry, no matter what profession you are in, you never suggest how you should be rewarded before any work has been done. I knew what was to come would be anything but acceptable.
On to the actual work… they wrapped everything for protection, which was good, but it took 5 minutes to wrap each piece of furniture and they used all 3 guys to do so. They had 3 guys, yet 1 guy insisted on carryiong everything himself and other 2 would guide him and then help load it into the truck, which took another 5 minutes including smoke breaks every other load. This was repeated over and over…3 and a half hours later, these 3 guys packed a small 2 bedroom apartment — not impressed and still worried about the quality of how they packed our belongings.
On to the delivery… they somehow managed to take 15 — 20 minutes to get to our new place (5 blocks away) and take another 10 to situate the truck after asking for guidance a second time on where to park. And then the rain started… THANK YOU RAIN! The rain was the best part of the whole day — the rain turned these guys against each other and they started arguing about everything. Soon, all they wanted to do was get the job over with. All of the sudden these guys started moving like I have never seen before. THANK YOU RAIN! Still, I needed to speed it up a little more, so I jumped in and ended up moving more than 2 of the movers themselves.
Over all, do not use this company. After 4.5 hours, a broken lamp, a ruined couch and a horrible experience with 3 drunk clowns, please, save yourself the experience I went through for you and pay an extra $ 10 per hour to go with someone else! Ahh, finally, moved in. Nightmare is over.