review: 1300-bike-move PERTH TO MELBOURNE

[Jeram]

I have decided to post up a review to pass on my experience with 1300-bike-move to others who might be looking to freight a bike between australian capital cities.

My particular bike was in Perth and I needed to get it to Melbourne.

The quoted price was $725, which was $25 cheaper than the next cheapest company which offered a depot to depot service including crating.
$5000 insurance was also supplied.

The quoted time frame for freight was 14-18 days.

So far my bike has sat in storage for two weeks as their WA crating division ran out of crates, apparently just before my bike was dropped off in mid September.
More crates were apparently just a few days off according to 1300 bike more correspondence.

10 days later more crates arrived, and I was informed that my bike would be crated up and would be in Melbourne within 5 days.
I then received another email shortly after stating that they have run out of crates again.
I would have thought that my bike would have been first in line as it was there just as the last batch of crates ran out.

My question now is, how can a crating company run out of crates, twice!
That'd be like a car yard running out of cars, twice!

So now its just a waiting game, waiting for them to grow some brain cells and learn how to count how many bikes are in their shed before ordering the next batch of crates.

So far, I would rate them as 4/10
but the bike hasnt turned up yet so that score may improve or be reduced depending on what they do over the next 2 weeks.

Regards,
Jeram

[L.B.]

I used to manage a heavy haulage division.Was always easy to get loads to go from east to west,most times we ran floats back east empty....
There is a couple transport web sites that companies listed loads or back loads,here are a couple you may want to look at?All you'd have to do is make sure its crated properly.
More to the point I remember someone on that PSB site had a bike crate up for grabs.Might be worth looking at?
http://www.backloads.com/
http://www.backloadmoving.com.au/

[Jeram]

yeah, too late though.
money has changed hands and bike has been dropped off.
No refunds

I knew I could get it much cheaper if I could get the bike crated up, but realized that Im not in WA to crate up the bike.

[EPApolice]

Sometimes the cheapest option is also the worst one. It sounds to me like they are just waiting to find space on a semi and the bike is being transported by a general carrier and not a bike specific one. Due to the lack of demand for bikes from the west to the east it would not make sense financially to have a truck transporting bikes alone every week.
Of couse they dont tell the customer this and you get the shits when you get stuffed around.

[peet]

think epa is on the money there

i brought 3 bikes from the east & to perth & with out the help of the salers it would not of happend with ease & peace of mind
only found bike mover in easten states & that was limited to the lower east
bike crates are a give away to a carton of beer
as lb said a lot of freight comes from the east & trucks run back empty
to trucks running back on trailers

my father inlaws friend has start a bike resto work shop
where you can hire storage & bench space ,tools ,sandblaster ,painting booth ,lathes, presses ,etc
also doing bike recovery

may be he should also look at inspecton of bike with relocation to buyer
as he loves being around bikes
hes retied from work & had some werhouses not rented so moved his projects there & things have moved from that

peet

[Jeram]

Problem is, my bike has yet to even join the line waiting for a cheap ride to Melbourne...
The bikes still sitting in a shed waiting to be crated.

It cant join the queue for freighting until its crated... Grrrrr!

Hopefully after I gave them a peice of my mind they will get there arse into gear and put it on a truck asap once its crated.

[Jeram]

yes!

Bike is crated and should have it in 5 days or so

[ken007]

well a bit of success at last, let us know when it arrives safe and sound

[Jeram]

will do!

[Jeram]

bike turned up only 2 days late compared to what they had promised so I cant really complain.

the guys they contracted at North Line Transport in sunshine were fantastic.
they called me several times to make sure I knew the items had arrive, very friendly, and they used two forklifts to lift the very long crate (ex Harley Davidson crate) onto the tiny trailer and then off again when we realized it was too long.
Then allowed us to piss far around for half an hour un-crating the bike and putting it on the trailer.

but yeah, the bike made it in good condition so Im happy.

I now give 1300 bike quote a rating of 7.5/10 and I would recommend them will the only comments being that you allow atleast a week ontop of what they've promise so that you dont end up disapointed.
and my other thought is that it would be much much cheaper to cut out the middle man and arrange the crating/freighting yourself.

but yeah, it wasn't a bad experience overall, and the middle man is nice to have as it removes the stress of organizing everything if your like me and am flat out juggling work and study.