Direct Auto Carrier

Whoa, this is a shady organization. Advertise that they own the trucks that ship your car but I had to deal with a broker. That was a concern but when the car I was shipping to my daughter showed up with a different trunk compartment that included a spoiler is when things got really strange. I dealt with James from Direct Auto Carriers who ignored my first contact completely and it wasn’t until I wrote him that I was going to contact the police that he responded at all. His response was basically that I needed to contact the local broker and deal with it myself. What a joke of an organization should have known they were bad news when they told me my daughter had to pay in cash when the car showed up. Awful, stay away from this place!!!

Update: Direct Auto Carrier has given me a partial refund of my initial deposit. Unfortunately this does not cover the weeks of car rental fees that we incurred due to their error or even the discrepancy between the quoted price and that which the driver required to release our car.
I have since received various threatening emails from them, and a number of messages from people whose experience is like mine.
Here is an excerpt from a recent email from James.
«You are a complete Ass and mark my words, a complete scumbag for adding to your lies and allegations. Why don’t you get a life you idiot. Your review is baseless and coming from someone with a brain of a grapefruit, you are just pathetic. I am glad you never got any money back. You don’t deserve it.»
And that was after his admission that the original error was his.

Just had my car dropped off after buying it in an auction in NY. This was my first car move but when the car got here there was not one scratch on the car, it came early which was good because I flew in and had no transportation except über. I had a good experience with them. Just thought I’d share since all I ever Unilocal about is mostly food! Hehe.

If I could give this poor excuse for a company no stars, I would.
Direct Auto Carriers made an already stressful move from Ft Worth to Seattle even more stressful by continually stringing me along with the promised pick up date. I called a day in advance to see about an estimated pick up window, and James said he would look into it; instead, I was transferred over to Randy, who only told me that the car would be picked up after four. This was the start of a common theme — James, I believe, is either too timid to deal with customers or just totally clueless on any information regarding shipments.
My scheduled pick up day (Thursday) came and went without a single phone call or update from anyone affiliated with the company. As it got later, I tried calling James, Randy, and their «Customer Support Line» — all three directed me to voicemail. Notably, the Customer Support Line voicemail was suspiciously uncharacteristic, not mentioning the company name at all, which I found particularly odd. I ended up leaving James an email, hoping that perhaps he could be reached that way.
I got a phone call from James the next morning, who assured me that as soon as Randy got into the office 30 minutes later he would call me with an update. I finally was forced to call Randy after a full hour passed with no phone call, and was told that the truck broke down the day before in Houston and that it was being fixed. I was told to call back around noon — a common theme with Randy! — for an update. When I did, I was told that a back up truck was coming through Houston a day or two later, so we agreed that I would drive my car from Fort Worth down to Houston to be loaded there. I was told that there was a chance the car would be loaded Friday evening or Saturday, and at the very latest Monday morning on the backup truck.
Friday and Saturday came and went without any further updates, and no one answered any phones outside business hours, so we were left completely in the dark. Monday was officially the breaking point. I called James first thing in the morning, who again told me to call back in 30 minutes when Randy got to the office. I called Randy and asked for an ETA for my pick up, as well as the driver’s contact information. He told me that he didn’t know and that I had to call him back at noon. Maybe the guy clocks in and then watches Good Morning America for three hours??? I have no idea.
When I called at noon, at this point feeling like a broken record, and asked for an ETA, I was told that the truck was delayed, and that it would «probably» have to be the next morning, but that he had no confirmation. As far as driver contact info, I was told that he still didn’t have it. After this call, I was officially agitated, and started brainstorming backup options and decided to check if our deposit had actually gone through. My mom and I then discovered that the company charged us TWICE for our deposit! I gave the company until 4 PM to get a «confirmation» in order, and when they failed to do so, we called and told James that we wanted out of our deal and our deposit refunded (including the EXTRA one). He put us on hold, and then seconds later had our call picked up by Randy, officially proving my theory that James is an unethical, non-​trustworthy, and overall cowardly employee. Randy continued to relay the same tired story to us that he «didn’t know where the truck was», and that he didn’t have a confirmed driver. At this point, we emphasized that we were terminating our contract and wanted nothing to do with the company from that point forward.
This was long, but I was mad. Short version: Absolutely no communication, poor customer service, I was endlessly dragged along, and they charged our card twice for the deposit without telling us. I wouldn’t trust this company to call me back on time, let alone to safely transport my car. I had to call another company and my car will be late, but at least I’ll be able to sleep soundly knowing that I won’t be at the mercy of this awful company any longer.