Transporting your car can be a nightmare if you don’t follow these simple steps.  Keep in mind that the overwhelming number of people that transport their car never have any problems whatsoever.  For the small subset of people that have problems when they ship their car, the vast majority could have been avoided if they had just followed a few basic rules.

1. Research your car transport company.

Make sure that you thoroughly research the car transport company that you are thinking about using.  You can search websites like Rip Off Report to research your car transport company. Also you can google your broker’s name as well as his company with search terms modifiers like avoid or sucks. This will help you dig out any bad information before you make a decision on moving your car. EX: If the car moving company you are thinking about using is ABC Car movers … Google ABC Car Movers sucks or avoid ABC Car Movers.

2. Get multiple car shipping quotes from individual car transport companies.

Make sure you get multiple quotes from different car shipping companies. Since most car shipping companies are really car shipping brokers, they are all going to have different contacts. Most truckers check a centralized shipping request database daily to find their next load of cars. They naturally go for the higher bids first and then the lower bids get picked up if they happen to be on the way or close to a place they are already going. This means that you must allow more time to get a lower priced bid to get picked up.

3. Don’t automatically take the lowest car transport bid.

In general, the longer you can be without your car and the more time you have in general will mean a lower overall bid for you. If you have time constraints (as most people do when moving a car) don’t take the lowest bid because too many things have to happen in order for the car to get to your destination. A mid ranged bid is more likely to get picked up by another driver on short notice than a low ball bid will.

4. Leave yourself plenty of time for the car transfer process.

Things like weather, natural disasters, fires etc. can greatly affect your car move. Leave time to account for these issues.

5. Get all of the fees in writing ahead of time and READ YOUR AGREEMENT before you sign.

There are no shortage of horror stories about brokers charging a customer’s credit card for a car move and then trying to up the fees as the date gets closer or even after the car is in the broker’s possession. Usually the driver will be unaware of these issue if they arise, so greeting him with animosity is not going to help your cause as he is an independent contractor and really has no involvement. If a broker cannot give you a written guarantee of your shipping costs, move on. In certain cases there may be instances where there is a possibility of additional fees. Have your broker explain those ahead of time (including the amounts) so that you can completely understand your car shipping quote ahead of time.