Singapore has a reputation of being safe, relatively corruption-free and law-abiding, so most people are not overly worried about getting cheated by their moving company. However, low crime does not mean no crime and you would do well to take note of these red flags before you hire a home or office mover.
Ensure that You are Working with a Registered Company
Starting a moving company has low barriers to entry, so you may find that you are spoilt for choice when you google ‘movers in Singapore‘.
While it may be easy to start a moving company, ensuring that it’s well-managed and being able to provide excellent service to their customers are a different matter.
In Singapore, it’s very easy to check if a company is registered with the government. Head over to bizfile.gov.sg and search for their company name. You want to work with a moving company that has the proper resources and infrastructure in place, not a fly-by-night company that may disappear the next day.
They Don’t Send Someone to Provide You with a Free Quote
We have been helping both homes and offices to move for over 25 years. With so much experience in the moving industry, you are bound to learn a few things. One of them is that not every move is the same. Even if we have moved a thousand families from four bedroom HDB apartments, it does not mean that the next moving project involving a four-room HDB flat will be exactly the same. Each move will have its own challenges.
The only way for a moving company to provide you with an accurate quote will be to have a look at your apartment and physically assess how many items you have, what type of items you need to be moved and if there are any challenges in moving your items from your current location to your new one.
Sometimes, if your move is not too complicated, you can get away with sending over a few photographs and getting an accurate quote. However, nothing beats the accuracy of having a representative visit your home and giving you a quote directly from a site survey.
They Charge a Large Deposit
Some moving companies in Singapore will ask you to pay a deposit to confirm the job. A deposit by itself is not a major issue. They do need some form of commitment from their clients before they can set aside resources for the move, after all. As a moving company, they do not want to have to bring their entire team down just to have a move cancelled at the last minute.
However, it is the size of the deposit that you should be wary of.
Take some time to do more research if the moving company asks for a very large deposit prior to the job.
They Quote You Very Cheap Prices
We all like things to be both good and cheap. This is no different when it comes to moving services; we prefer them cheaper. However, you should be very concerned if the prices quoted to you seem drastically cheaper than the other quotes that you received.
Some disreputable moving companies have been known to send over a very cheap quote, move the boxes from your apartment to the lift landing or ground floor, then request that you pay additional fees because they will claim that the number of items was more than what they had initially anticipated. At that point, their customers would have no choice but to pay the additional fees.
They Only Take Cash
As they say, cash is king. But every business should have more than one way for them to get paid. At the very least, a bank transfer should be possible. Be wary of companies that will only take cash as its only form of payment.
They Ask You to Sign Blank or Incomplete Documents
When you are in the middle of a move – especially if you’re moving from a different country – you may have gotten into the habit of signing documents without properly reading them. Do not do this when you are signing a contract with your movers. You are putting yourself at risk and they can fill in any information they want at a later date.
