UHaul - Cheap Move or Big Mistake?
Cheap price for a cheap service U Haul If you need a truck but you have time to loose this is the company. They don't have all the equipment available and usually the truck is not...
If you rent a trailer you should make sure you have a Hitch U Haul From Uhaul.com you could see one way trailer cheapest, about $25. However, before you make reservations for the trailer, please make sure...
I’m not a first timer when it comes to renting from Uhaul. For each of my past house moves, I’ve gone the U haul, you-haul-it way. Each time, I’ve had my share of headaches, but nothing has surpassed my recent nightmare.
I ordered a truck online, as always, opting for their largest rental truck. The day before picking up the Uhaul truck, I received the standard call informing me of the location to pick up the truck and the time the place opened. I was quite pleased–I’d be going to a regular Uhaul rental place not too far from where I lived and the place opened at 7 AM so we could get an early start packing. After all, it was predicted to be well over 90 degrees that day.
Then, strike one hit. Uhaul called later that day and said our first truck had mechanical problems. That didn’t catch me by surprise. Instead of our being able to pick up a truck from around the University of Akron region, we would have to drive a good ways further up to Stow, Ohio and pick up a truck there. And, the place (Myers Appliances of Stow) didn’t open until 9 AM, so we would lose a good chunk of our morning. I had some truck loading help arriving early that morning, and that would cut back on their usefulness too, as they had to leave early that afternoon.
My father in law & I arrived the next morning at Myers Appliances of Stow and found a man there (presumably the owner?) who indicated they didn’t rent Uhaul trucks out often. I asked for my typical Uhaul rental dolly and Uhaul blankets, but, alas, he didn’t have those either. He did have plenty of new washing machines, dryers, ovens, fridges, etc., but not the typical items a Uhaul rental place has. Apparently, renting Uhauls was something he recently began doing on the side to make a spare buck here and there.
After all the paperwork in his office was completed, he took us outside to look at the truck. There were only two Uhaul trucks in the parking lot which was a regular, strip parking lot easily accessible by anyone. The trucks were parked within easy view of the main road. One of the trucks was old and the other was practically brand new–of course, when we first arrived, we’d both dreamily hoped the new Uhaul truck would be the one we’d get (but, somehow, deep within, we doubted that, and our suspicion was right–the new truck was in for repairs). As we walked toward the trucks, the Myers Appliance guy showed us the huge welt that the new Uhaul truck had recently been rewarded during its last rental–a gash through the wall about mid level, exposing the composite wood the wall had been made of. The new truck was nice with barely any miles on it. Guess its last driver didn’t have everything all together.
The Uhaul rental guy gave us a walkaround the older Uhaul truck which would be ours, pointing out scratches and saying that Uhaul already knew about each of those. (I thought he was supposed to describe those on the contract, like the description on the back shows–but I guess he should know what he’s doing). I asked him if we had to add oil to the truck, and he seemed surprised. That led him to open up the truck’s hood so we could check the oil. He said it looked like it had recently been changed and that nothing was wrong with the truck–the oil was fine and none would need to be added. The Stow Myers Appliance/Uhaul Rental guy gave us the contract, verbally telling us (and writing it down) that the truck had 7/8 of a tank full of gas. We thanked him, started the truck, and went on our merry way … or so we thought.
The drive home from Myers Appliance of Stow was about 15 miles–not really significant until you realize that Uhaul’s default mileage for our rental (from Green, Ohio to Stewartstown, PA) was only 380 miles. Then, the extra drive from Green to Stow added up. Thankfully, the guy at Myers Appliance in Stow, where we rented the Uhaul, gave us (and this is literally what the contract says) 400 additional miles for our trip. I think he intended to give us a total of 400 miles instead of 380–not 780 miles!
That day, we loaded up the Uhaul, finished cleaning up the house, and headed out at 7:30 the next morning to leave Ohio for eastern Pennsylvania. And, then, the fun began.
I was driving my car in the lead, my wife was driving our minivan, and Larrie was driving the Uhaul truck. The Uhaul truck had a gas gauge which didn’t have the E for empty or the F for full on it. It just had two circles–one on the left and one on the right with a lot of lines in between. When we left the Uhaul place, the needle was practically on the circle on the left. As the guy at the Uhaul rental place told us the tank was 7/8 full, we naturally assumed that that circle on the left stood for a completely full tank. After all, every vehicle is different, and gauges in vehicles vary as much as the sun does from the moon.
About 45 miles or less after we’d left, we just got on the Ohio Turnpike (toll road) and were going through some construction when I noticed the Uhaul truck was slowing down. The speed limit increased once the work area was over with, and then I didn’t see the Uhaul truck any more. My wife called me on my cell a few moments later saying that her dad (Larrie) said the Uhaul truck was sputtering, shaking, and losing speed–especially on any incline. He finally pulled over to the road, and so did we, a couple miles in front of him. When he tried to restart the truck, it wouldn’t start at all.
So … first thing I did was pull out my Uhaul contract and give the Uhaul helpline a call. They said they like to help customers with trouble within an hour, though there would possibly be up to 1/2 hour at first for them to locate a mechanic. The funny thing about it, is I was parked at the side of the interstate just a few yards behind a mile marker sign, so I gave that info to the Uhaul customer help girl. Turns out, she was using mapquest! The milemarker did her no good. I had to basically walk her from our starting point, through the roads we’d taken, all the way to where we were. She just wanted to know the closest city … and I had no clue, other than the fact that we were just a few miles west of the OH/PA border.
Well, finally, we found the closest town/city that had a Uhaul certified repair guy. After a lengthy wait–partially outside until a red ant attack and rain, and then inside my car while it poured cats & dogs–the guy finally showed up. While we’d been on the phone with him earlier, we’d described our situation and how the Uhaul rental truck had been responding. Now, keep in mind that the very last thing we would even be thinking of was the gas tank. Larrie thought it was the gas filter since it definitely seemed like a gas access problem. But, the gas tank being empty? That was crazy! The tank was a 60 gallon tank and was 7/8 full just a few miles (about 60) ago! Or, so we had been told and so our printed contract said, and thus we interpreted the less-than-clear gauge in the truck. But, while we were on the phone, the guy asked us if the gas tank was empty, so, to humor him and satisfy our own curiosity, we checked. There was no locking gas cap–just one anybody could unscrew. You couldn’t see in the tank, so we rapped it in different spots. It sounded as hollow as anything. Plain empty. We couldn’t believe it.
So, the Uhaul mechanic guy came out in his truck, and we made sure he brought some gas cans–just in case that was the problem. Meanwhile, I’m racking my brain trying to figure out just exactly how this all had happened. I later called Myers Appliances in Stow and got a girl there who said that, yes, they had a history of having people siphon gas out of their Uhaul trucks and that, yes, the guy who’d rented out the truck to us had failed to follow standard UHaul protocal and start the engine and verify the gas reading at the exact moment we rented the truck. So, the gas reading on our contract was merely the gas reading of the truck when it arrived at his open and very non secure parking lot; the gas reading on the contract was not a mirror of the actual gas reading when we rented the truck and removed it from the parking lot.
What really tipped my nerves is that the mechanic guy said that we’d be responsible for the service call since it was just an empty tank of gas. He said that was our responsibility. Now … I can see his perspective, but I can also see ours. Thankfully, he drove behind us to the nearest exit where we filled up the truck with gas (he’d brought two cans of gas which he’d poured into the truck). I put in over 51 gallons of gas. That gas then lasted us for 4 1/2 hours of driving; it probably would have lasted us longer, but I had Larrie stop and fill up the tank again–not wanting to run the risk of running out again! Also, I was taking preventative measures just in case the gas gauge was faulty or there was a gas leak somewhere.
So, now that we’ve arrived at our final destination, the fun with UHaul begins. Who is responsible for paying for the service call to bring us some gas so we could go to a gas station and fill up the tank? If we’d known that gas was the only problem, we had two gas cans inside the Uhaul–probably about 6 or 7 gallons worth when filled–and I had my car and could have easily ran down to the gas station and taken care of that myself. We naturally assumed something more serious was wrong, and I was dreading having to move everything from the well packed Uhaul truck into a replacement truck. I was also dreading spending many, many hours alongside of the interstate waiting and waiting for Uhaul to finally come and help.
Who is responsible for paying for the gas–not only the gas which the Uhaul mechanic brought but also the $160+ I had to pay to fill up the gas tank to begin with? It was so tempting to bring the Uhaul truck back to the Uhaul drop off place here in Pennsylvania with the tank practically empty to help make up for all the problems, but I didn’t want to face even more fees and headache from UHaul. Of course, now, they’ll probably argue and argue that I should have done just that. Just got to love it.
After calling Myers Appliances of Stow, Ohio and getting their confession, and asking them to call UHaul (which they appear to have not done), I’ve spent a bunch of time today calling various UHaul regional offices. I tried calling the regional office in York county, PA to find out how much UHaul was billing me for, but their computers were partially down. I then called the regional office in Akron, OH who said that UHaul trucks having gas siphoned off was quite common in Akron (especially at the University of Akron UHaul place) and the lady referred me to call the main UHaul offices in Pittsburg. Pittsburg? She said they had special personnel who handle such cases. So, I called Pittsburg, got bounced around from person to person until someone finally hung up on me. That was weird. I then called Akron’s main office once again and got some other guy. He actually knew the shopping plaza in Stow where I’d gotten my Uhaul rental truck from and said he’d never been aware of them having a gas siphoning problem, but he was kind enough to give me the first name of their executive assistant who I will need to call back on Monday to tell my story yet once again.
Since I paid for everything with my good old MasterCard, I’m wondering how long it will be until I have to get my credit card company involved in all of this.
Got to love UHaul … Now, if only they started making locking gas caps on all their trucks, they could minimize some of this ridiculousness. But that would cost money, wouldn’t it? And UHaul just wants to make money. But, surely, the loss would pay for itself within a week or less.
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Tags: packing
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