Shipping agent required! Essex to Houston
 

A very good morning to you all,
my first post and a cry for help!!
Looking to ship a 20' container of personnel effects from Essex, England to Houston, Texas, USA in the next week and a half and would value your recommendations as much as any "don't touch with a barge pole" cautions!
Looking for a door to door service although unpacking at the US end will be into storage!
Who did you use??
What did it cost??
Any unforeseen, undisclosed fees along the way??
What did you pay for insurance??
Do's and Don'ts

Your input is appreciated, thankyou

Re: Shipping agent required! Essex to Houston
 

We are using Shipit.co.uk and it hasn't finished yet, so I can't comment on whether or not we are happy. We chose the door to door service and they can deliver to a house or to storage. (It's not yet clear whose job it is to physically move it off the truck and into its destination, though.)

It cost about 4,200 pounds for 412 cubic feet (think it was 12 cubic metres) of stuff, including 4% insurance on anything we wanted to insure.

The collection in London was quick, efficient and professional.

Hidden costs:

1) 20 pound fumigation fee for each pallet-worth of goods (five pallets for us)

2) Tax on the insurance, I think it was something like 5% of the cost of insurance, which was 4% of stated value. So a 100pound item would have an extra 4 pounds insurance cost, if I wanted it insured, and then 20p in tax on that insurance.

Also since we packed our own goods the insurance only covers loss or theft, not damage, which is a bit of a ripoff.

There was something else I was going to say but I forgot; if it comes back I will add it.

Re: Shipping agent required! Essex to Houston
 

We used Anglo-Pacific for exactly the same move (Essex to Houston) in a 20ft container. I think it was about GBP 3,600 but can't remember exactly. (I'm sure I posted it on a previous thread). Not sure whether you'll be able to do it that quickly. They told us we had to give a certain amount of notice to the local authority to put the container on the street etc.

Good luck!

Doug

Re: Shipping agent required! Essex to Houston
 

We used Pickfords, 20ft container London to west coast including insurance and they did all the packing an unpacking £4200.

Very pleased arrived earlier than they said it would take and the packers were very helpful at both ends.

Re: Shipping agent required! Essex to Houston
 

Oop - should've checked first - Anglo-Pacific were GBP 4,201 door to door including packing and unpacking (they can do storage at either end). We didn't buy insurance and nothing was damaged. We didn't get any extra customs charges at this end either.

Cheers,

Doug.

Re: Shipping agent required! Essex to Houston
 

Now that's a new one on me.
Thanks for the heads up :thumbup:

4% + tax exc. acc damage sounds awfully steep to me :confused:

Re: Shipping agent required! Essex to Houston
 

Thanks for your input :thumbup:

Re: Shipping agent required! Essex to Houston
 

how long did the process take all in all??
appreciate it :thumbup:

Re: Shipping agent required! Essex to Houston
 

Thanks Doug


seems pretty expensive to me all in all,
two guys and a transit to load,
drive down the docks,
chuck it into a container,
bloke in a crane loads it onto a freighter,
freighter sails at 2mph for 5 weeks (how much diesel can that use up, right?)
two blokes with funny accents unload at the other end,
throw it on your drive, job done
:D


just kidding,
thanks for the input people

Re: Shipping agent required! Essex to Houston
 

Well you're certainly accurate on the "chucking" and "throwing" aspect at least! Make sure you take out all the insurance you can afford! :)

Re: Shipping agent required! Essex to Houston
 

I hear you :)

Re: Shipping agent required! Essex to Houston
 

Packing started November 17th they finished packing on the 18th and had the container sent to the house and loaded it by 2pm and it left straight to Southampton docks. It arrived at LAX port December 26th was delivered to our Milwaukie house January 2nd.

Re: Shipping agent required! Essex to Houston
 

Yeah, we weren't hugely pleased with the insurance costs and the exclusion of damage. DH said it sounded like a pretty good racket because they can just throw stuff around intentionally and break it if they want to. We ended up insuring some things, but not all.

BTW the price I gave at the top was inclusive of all extra fees.

Re: Shipping agent required! Essex to Houston
 

Might not help to much, but worth a search all the same, but there was a huge load of people moving to Houston last summer and a lot of info on the subject then that you might be able to find.