Uhaul hates us

Below is a letter that John has sent to Uhaul...

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I have a massive problem.

I booked a truck for last night, I was given a "guaranteed" confirmation number (#7751876) and told that I would get a call back.

Nobody called, so I called back to the main u-haul call centre where I made the reservation.  After a long time on hold, a customer service representative came on the line and told me that he would transfer me to the rental place directly.  The rental place was apparently either busy or otherwise occupied because the CSR came back on the line and gave me a number to call them myself the next morning.

The next morning, (this morning, Thursday June the 26th) an agent called back and confirmed the rental to be picked up at the Bermondsey road location in Toronto at 5:30 this afternoon and returned Saturday at 5:30.

Thinking that everything was sorted out, we arranged for loaders to be available on Friday evening.

However, after driving to the rental agency this afternoon, (an hour on the road) we were told that the truck was, in fact, not available.  The person at the agency said that she had tried to call us to unconfirm the confirmation, but we were not at home. We had waited for the confirmation this morning, but once it came we left.

The agent called the regional manager and after waiting a longish time in the office, we were told that we could have a truck from this evening to first thing saturday if we went to the Toronto Warden Avenue office.

Once we got to the Warden Avenue office, (another half an hour drive) and waiting at the counter, we were told that our rental had been transfered there, but that we could only have the truck until noon on Friday and while she was very sorry, there was nothing she could do about getting the truck for any longer than that since there simply wasn't anything available.  Since our helpers weren't coming until Friday evening, this obviously wouldn't do us any good.  She did say we could call the rental line to get the $50.00 fee back though.

However, our tale does not yet end.  We tried to call the a rental line, only to be faced with one busy signal after another for around ten minutes until the call was finally picked up and we were placed on the call cue.

Since I have a timer on my cell phone, I know that we were sitting in the call cue for 37 minutes until the recorded message finally stopped, the line started ringing, and stayed that way for another 8 minutes until I gave up and disconnected after 45 minutes being waiting for someone to tell me something, but coming up completely empty.

Which brings us to now.  I've now spent three hours driving around Toronto and waiting in line at two different uhaul offices; spent, almost an hour and a half waiting on hold on the rental line over two days and I have no truck or any chance of getting one from uhaul or, at this point, anywhere else until next Wednesday.  I need to be out of my house on Monday, and I have no clue whatsoever how I'm going to get my furniture to my new house.

The $50.00 from the "guaranteed reservation" seems very small recompense for the level of frustration, time, energy and gas I've spent on the ultimately futile attempt to get a truck from you.

With the single exception of Megan at the Warden Avenue location, who was utterly professional and efficient, nobody I dealt with throughout this ordeal gave me any confidence in the organization whatsoever.

To say I'm unimpressed with the level of customer service, organization and professionalism at uhaul would be a massive understatement.

The only thing at this point that would make me anything less than absolutely furious would be that a truck is made available to me tomorrow with no rental fee charged.