My experience and advice on moving company work

I believe my advice to working at a moving company warrants its own thread. I will go over my observations and finally what usually goes on with a crew.

I worked in the warehouse and was the one folding pads as the freight was unloaded . The pads are used to protect furniture from getting damaged. You can tape or use rubber bands that are designed to hold the pads in place. Getting the tape off of pads can be a royal pain in the rear end. If you do not remove it right away hence why some drivers won’t even tape pads and just use rubber bands.

From my experience, all military freight had to be itemized, and my former company treated everything meaning every piece of furniture that we touched like it was damaged. All photos were taken and the person usually doing the light lifting or helping putting the pieces together in the trailer or box truck was the one taking the photos. That way if the customer said that there was damage to the item after it got back to our warehouse for storage until they could deliver it, we could easily provide proof of the condition. It was in when we moved it.

According to my former owner, we did not have to itemize non-military customers though we did it for our protection. Like I mentioned before, we took photos of each and every piece of belonging we touched.

at first, when I started, there were no crates that housed the customers items, but later, on towards the end of my employment is when we started placing stuff and crates. Also, we went through a lot of skids meaning pallets. At one point in time, my former Company was offering pallets for free.

If you get hired on to a moving company, chances are you’ll start at the bottom, meaning folding pads, operating a forklift, learning how to do paperwork, and possibly working in the office when they need you. In other words, you have to prove yourself.

Unless you have prior experience, you will not get to drive right off the bat. As much as I hate to say it, you will need to earn the supervisor of the drivers respect and chances are you will get a shot to prove your worth.

If you don’t get hired to drive, asked to see if you can get a shot. You will have to learn how to fold pads, wrap, furniture using pads, and in some cases using tape or the rubber bands, like I mentioned above. Last, but not least, you’ll need to know how to load a trailer/box truck. I have never seen one that wasn’t loaded to the brim.

Some things that I have witnessed: A lot of the drivers that were contractors at my former company were 1099 contracted employees looking for a last chance job opportunity’s. A couple had records and could not go on military bases. They had been to other places and not succeeded. Hence why the company I worked for was a second chance company.

The one exception I saw was the crew leader, who had over 30 years of experience. He had followed the owner once the owner opened up his own company. We had one contractor who griped about a cleaning charge and was told that if he didn’t like it, he could find another place of employment. My former company went through a lot of contractors as my company owner demanded a lot from the employees he employed.

I usually got left alone. I was in the warehouse and usually my task were as followed: take out the trash, fold pads, sweep the warehouses, clean up cigarette butts using a grab stick. Whenever I was around the crews, they were talking smack, and if you weren’t talking smack, then you didn’t fit in. That’s the way how it went with my former employer.

as with any job, come, you have your negatives and your positives. The heat in the warehouse can be unbearable and if you do not have a gallon water jug for sipping on water constantly you can suffer heat stroke.

I cannot tell you the number of times while I was working in the office, fellow employees came in and asked for water. The owner jokingly said to his office staff that he was not running a Wawa, a.k.a. convenience store.

in the warehouse, I usually drink right around a half a gallon to sometime 3/4 of a gallon of water. Due to my surgery, I had to be sipping on something just to keep myself hydrated. Also, I was the lowest paid man that they had employed. They were advertising for the job when I applied for $16 an hour through $28 an hour depending on experience. I was only making $12 an hour as a warehouse clerk.

The one who made money were the lumpers. they were paid a flat fee regardless of how long it took them to do the job. For example, if they did the job in two hours, which was often done, they were making money. Sometimes they would have two jobs per day.

We usually contracted lumpers during our busy season. According to my former employer, that was from May until September. Whenever a company dropped off a load that we were taking to the final destination, they hired local lumpers. Usually to offload 10,000 pounds, it took right around an hour and a half.

bottom line:

this job is not for everybody. You have to be physically fit and learn how to do the job quickly. I’m not gonna say why I put in my notice. I will just say that it didn’t work out in my favor and I was never going to be able to drive for them. I learned a lot and I’m very thankful for that. Hopefully my information above helps someone looking to breaking into the industry that needs a chance.