Grace Removals Group

It started very well with Grace Removals, but ended up being a truly disappointing and expensive experience.

My wife and I have moved with furniture many times before, e.g. Denmark>USA, USA>Australia and Australia>Denmark, so we know how things work and what you can expect and not expect.

Before the move:
Friendly, funny and competent service, and prompt answers to our questions. It all felt very safe with Grace and we therefore decided to move ahead with them, while turning down offers from slightly more expensive moving companies.

After this the warning signs started; very slow email replies, our contact person was always OOO, we couldn’t get time with Grace to understand and discuss our insurance needs, and a Danish referral Grace tried to contact to talk about his experience with Grace never replied.

Good thing was that we had paid AUD300 to get a specially designed casing to protect our most expensive and beloved furniture - a marble coffee table, bought for USD+2,500 in the US while we were living there.

During the pick-up move in Australia:
The movers were 3 hours late and didn’t give any notice about this. Only two men showed up and the 5 hour time pick-up estimate ended up taking closer to 10 hours. That meant that we got our cleaning appointment later in the day canceled and had to rebook flight tickets to Sydney. This despite that Grace had visited our place, took pictures and noted down everything we wanted to move.

Worst thing here was that our contact person at Grace didn’t care at all - which in that situation is very stressful and you can’t really do much as you have placed all your trust in them.

The move in Denmark and after:
We got our things back to Denmark, and a third party Grace partner moving company stepped in. We (my wife and I) ended up helping all day with carrying moving boxes to the fourth floor, again due to a miscalculation from Grace’s side re. time needed. We were completely exhausted by 10PM after a full day of moving, even though we had paid to avoid doing any work ourselves.

BUT THE WORST THING - our beloved marble table was broken into two pieces, and with no chance of repairing it in any way. And then we truly got to see the worst side of Grace. Due to a misspelling(!) (and we are not native in English) related to the marble table in the insurance contract, Grace refused to compensate more than AUD900. Grace didn’t even care about the fact that we had pointed out again and again that we really wanted the best protection of our marble table and we needed help with the insurance contract… Grace didn’t even offer to compensate us for the cost of the casing.

After a few emails about the marble table and insurance, replied by Grace in such a rude and arrogant way, they just stopped replying to our emails. So now we have a worthless marble table, AUD900 to pay for a new coffee table with cost and shipping cost well-excending USD3,000 - and tonnes of frustrations and the feeling that we got tricked.

It’s not about the compensation, but it’s the feeling of disrespect and ‘Goliath against the Giant’ with even the best arguments not being enough.

It is the worst feeling ever, and we can therefore with all of our hearts, travel experience and manners recommend that you stay far, far away from Grace Removals.

Feel free to contact us with any questions, we want to make sure you don’t experience the same as we did; [email protected]

Very accommodating, helpful, friendly and professional staff. Extensive experience in international moves a must in my situation.

Helped through the whole process step by step by [name removed by Sirelo]. I was always kept informed. No hidden costs / unknown extras.

This would be a zero if possible to give that. An item cleared for shipping by their partner in the UK (2 inches by 1 inch bird figure) was mysteriously declared made of bark (it was painted wood) and I was told it could not be imported. My options: 1) clean it: cost $500 2) re-export it: cost $ 350 3) destroy it in their incinerator cost: $99. Very random figures. No breakdown of costs or explanation beyond 'administrative costs'.
Spoke to AQIS decision and was told it was fine to have figure posted back to the UK. Grace refused even though that is the law and they held my other goods hostage. Had to pay to have a sentimental item destroyed. Clearly a scam.
And when my goods did arrive, two items were broken that had been professionally packed by the movers. DO NOT USE THEM. Dishonest.

Lost or misplaced items still not delivered after six months.
I have 27 boxes (yes 27 boxes) undelivered and no explanation as to why they cannot be located . They contain many irreplaceable personal items.
Although covered by insurance the missing items are only of value to myself and my family and as such are irreplaceable.
I have been assured they will be delivered if and when located but I am still waiting.
The items were in storage for 6 months before delivery and one would have expected that they would be kept together.

Some items were broken of those that were delivered.

I would never use Grace again nor would I recommend them.

The worse movers I’ve ever used. I’ve moved to 16 countries. I’ve never seen such incompetence! The Manager should not be in that job. I paid for an international move, wrapping and for valuable statues to be crated. Due to the pandemic I had to store my belongings with them for 3months. The goods were not wrapped, they were literally dumped in their storage. One of the statues was broken beyond repair their excuse was that the crate made was too small for the statue. They had 3months! When it was time to pay for the damages they came up with excuses. Speaking to my lawyer the value of the statue was below $30,000. My only option is Queensland tribunal. Don’t ever use this company if you value your personal belongings. They treat your goods like trash. Boxes were not labeled correctly. Not to mention that on credit card transaction fee of 1.5% they charged an additional gst. Even if there was already a GST on the total invoice . In the end it cost me more money as I had to use a different company and paid for extra for international move wrapping.

Engaged Grace for an interstate move (NSW to NT) in November / December 2020. Sales rep was great, took a detailed evaluation of the items and the move volume, which came up to 1.25 the size of a 20-foot container. This meant that the shipment would come in two parts, and he suggested that we ensure the important items were packed first so that they would arrive first as the other container would have to wait to be filled with the items from another customer before it would be shipped, which was fine with us. Plus, the extra services offered made the difference between them and their competitors. Price came back higher than the rest, but they were the only ones that claimed to be able to meet the short time frame of the move (2 weeks).

The Sydney crew came to pack up the items and while they did a pretty good job, two issues started to ring alarm bells. Firstly, the movers came to start the packing at 1330 H, after another house pack-up that morning. Apparently, they were not informed that they were packing up a 4-bedroom house with a full gym in the garage. That forced them to work until 2000 H to get everything packed up. Secondly, when the movers were almost finished packing up the first 20-foot container, we enquired as to where the other container was. We were told that they did not know and that it was late in the afternoon and they may have to send another crew to complete the move the next day. When we contacted the BDM, he stated that he did not know if another container was scheduled. Eventually, a medium-sized moving truck was dispatched and picked up the rest of the items.

Then the cleaning crew arrived the following day and were surprised to learn that they would have to clean the horizontal blinds, even though I had emailed the list of cleaning requirements to the sales rep a whole week before. We were then told that, in order to add this cleaning to their scope of work, we would be charged an extra $150, which was paid immediately.

Due to the speed of the move, ended up taking an apartment which could not fit all our items. When the sales rep was informed of the delivery address, we were again charged an extra $450 for “difficult access at delivery”. As before, this was paid immediately.

We took a storage unit for the remainder of the items and was told that we would have to pay an extra $990 to split the delivery. And again, this was paid immediately.

Originally, we were given a delivery date of December 2nd, which was perfect for us as it would be one week after pack-up. We were told that it arrived in Darwin on that date, however, it could not be delivered until December 7th because of congestion due to a lot of volume going through the Darwin facility. So, we asked that the delivery be reshuffled in the yard into what was coming to the apartment and what was going to the storage unit. We were told that this was no problem. A day before the delivery was to be made, however, we received a call that the delivery would have to be postponed to December 18th because of our request for the reshuffle. We called the sales rep who stated that there was nothing that he could do but give me the contact for the Darwin facility manager. One call to this guy and he had it all sorted to deliver on the initial date of December 7th.

When the delivery was made on December 7th , approximately a third of my items were missing. They stated that the second container had not arrived and when it did, it would be delivered ASAP. Found quite a few items damaged: bar stool broken, dining room chairs gouged, bed headboard / footboard / rails ripped and water cooler leaking, to name a few. We saw that a lot of items that were carefully wrapped at pickup were found unwrapped at delivery, which contributed to the damage. Since we had only insured the big-ticket items such as TVs, washer, dryer, and dishwasher, we were not reimbursed for any damaged items.

When the second delivery was made on December 18th , 10% of our items were still missing. When we enquired, the Darwin site manager gave us the full story; the shipment had been put into three containers in Sydney. No reason was given for this and we were not informed of this from the outset.

We had the final delivery on December 24th and still, a few items were missing; most likely from being missed when the other containers were sent to their customers. These were picked up at the Darwin facility by us early January.

To summarise my rating of Grace:
Pros:
• Speed of quote
• Range of services
• Hard-working and under-appreciated delivery personnel
Cons:
• Price and pricing adjustments
• Slow and inadequate progress updates
• Apparent coordination issues between departments / facilities
• Yard personnel appear to have much less duty-of-care than their delivery counterparts.

[Name removed by Sirelo] provided a good service overall
[Name removed by Sirelo], the moving consultant was very proactive and helpful. Ceva who were subcontractors to move the vehicle deserve 0 stars.

I engaged Grace removals as they held themselves out to be Australia's hassle-free remover with no stress. This was important to me as my wife was left to handle the move alone in Sydney as I was trapped in Adelaide due to COVID.

I chose them for this reason even though they were $3000 dollars more expensive than the next quote. I was trying to minimize the stress for my partner. What was delivered was an absolute mess and achieved the opposite of what I was paying extra to avoid.

Our belongings arrived in Adelaide but that was the total and only value of this move. The handling and management of the move was disastrous from Go to Woah.

It was perhaps among the most stressful experiences I have ever had. Here is a list;

- Quote process lacked detailed explanations of services included/excluded
- pre-pack boxes not delivered
- Grace's pre-pack up crew was hours late and did not complete the pre-pack properly. No phone call to advise us that they would be late we had to chase them to see where they were. Sitting around for ages just wondering and waiting.
- Grace pre-pack crew stuffed expensive our suits and leather/luxury item clothing into small boxes as the porta robes were not delivered.
- Uplift truck and crew were hours late, no call to advise. Frustrating as we had cordoned off space on the street and we were inconveniencing the other residents. Again sitting around, wasted hours, no communication.
- Grace crew complained that the pre-pack crew had not finished not their job.
- Move estimator had underestimated the load so they had to send for another truck. Eventually left the house on the day of the move at 8pm. 3 hours late.
- on the day of car pick up Grace truck was over nowhere to be seen so we rang and rang and rang and no one got back to us. The car pick up truck did not arrive at all. They then tried to blame us for this because we had changed the pickup address with them several days earlier. The funny thing was the truck didn't go to either place so classic case of shifting to the customer which is an absolute discredit to Grace.
- Grace cleaners were over 3 hours late with no phone call to advise.
-They did a poor job and our real estate agent refused to release our bond. Grace did remedy this with a clean they paid for.
- Then on the day of the delivery Grace advised us that an approximately 1/3 portion of our load had been left in Sydney and that it wouldn't be delivered for another week. We had received no previous advice of this and it was a very unpleasant surprise.
- We also discovered that our fridge and been dismantled by the removalists for no apparent reason as it went into the house without dismantling. They did this without permission and they damaged the fridge in the process. Replacement parts have to be ordered. After 2 weeks the fridge is still not serviceable.

Overall the this was a very poorly managed move. It lacked coordination, communication, and adequate supervision. To the most extent, many excuses placing blame on the customer has been offered. Seemingly no one at Grace had overall responsibility and at key moments, when things were going wrong no one could be contacted. It was also apparent that the Grace staff were not talking to each other and handing off different parts and facets of the move to each other.

Avoidance of the management stuff-ups and lack of 'doing what you say you're going to do and turning up at least in some proximity to the appointed time is the value that I was most keen to purchase. There was no such value at all in this move.

What has compounded the frustration is when Grace offers excuses like 'well you changed the pick-up address' as a reason the car pickup did not occur. You know when they start talking like this and they actually start telling themselves that this is a valid excuse for failure that you are wasting your time trying to get something resolved. They accepted the change, which was made days in advance so even suggesting this is somehow our fault is an insult to my intelligence.

I couldn't be less happy with this experience. It was terrible, just awful I can't endorse Grace at all.

The Gold coast side was a great experience, but when we arrived here furniture we were told would be assembled like bed lounges unwrapped and set up none of this was done.
This was disappointing to arrive to see this not done . We had 2 follow up calls from Grace , I explained to them our issues they seemed concerned but 2 weeks later still no one has got back to us.

We chose Grace removalists for our move from Sydney to Christchurch (NZ) from three other removalists as they were comparative in cost and were the only company that did an onsite quote.

It required a two day move with items in storage and two motorbikes. Day 1 packing team decided to take it easy and knock off at 2.30pm which meant there was two much work for Day 2. One of the packers had bad attitude; would not collapse shelving that we were told would be collapsed, had to be reminded several times to go back and pack rooms and items that had not been put on the truck. We then discovered that items had been missed from the inventory or were put down as 'owner packed' because they couldn't be bothered repacking items we had put into boxes for storage. This was a nightmare when it came to The Ministry of Primary Industries inspection with us having to double guess what these 'owner packed' items were.
The Good: We received our goods in New Zealand within 5 weeks and the receiving team in New Zealand were awesome, transferring our contents into another storage container on a temporary property.
The Bad - Grace management did not acknowledgement any concerns i raised about the competency of the packing team. We paid for the full package that included full unpacking of our goods into a new premise and removal of all packaging materials. However, we moved our items into another storage container on a family's property, so we did not make use of this. I sent several emails to Grace management querying the cost we had paid for a full service that we did not use as well as our inability to check for damaged items and and any proceeding insurance claims. They did not respond to any of my emails.

All in all I got the feeling that once the company had got your service it was a matter of getting the job done with zero care factor.

Three bedroom house - cost $17, 0000 for full service of unpacking goods in new premise and removal of packaging materials.

Worst removal experience - broke marble dining table then refused to pay proper compensation
I engage them to move some very expensive furniture including marble and art works- they promised they were experts and they would arrange crates and specialist art removalists - they completely failed - no special crates turned up - art specialist were simply young kids with no experience - they then broke my marble table worth $4500 then stuffed me around and would not pay proper compensation for weeks - don’t ever risk a move with this company they will completely screw it up and management will stuff you around simply to screw you over

Grace was beautiful at Selling their product. Unfortunately the hassle free, fully controlled door to door delivery that they sold is not what they delivered. I was super satisfied when I was sold Grace and felt like I was in good hands at the very beginning. They never communicated that there would be other vendors that they contract with that will charge you for their services to get your stuff actually to your door. I had more then a 10% increase in cost that wasn't ever communicated to me as something that might happen. Grace mislead me to believe that they would provide a well handled door to door delivery and they did not. Be wary as to what is actually in the quote they give you and know that you might have to pay more for what they commit to you from their vendors they work with.

quick reply, helpful staff, fair price, everything went well. i would recommend the company to anyone

Kept informed of progress good communication helpful in respects to paper work. Minimal stress with moving

Customer services rep visited to view move. Came back with quote and helped fill in all forms. Good service. Even helped to deregister vehicles.

After Grace removals picked up our belongings from Auckland to ship to Melbourne, we experienced the worst customer service from any company, in our entire lives. It has been 8 weeks now and we still have not heard from Grace.

At all.

We’ve contacted their customer service department several times to find out where our belongings are, and they have promised to get back to us. We have received no return communication. They have not called, emailed or messaged us a single time. We have been completely ignored.

Their brand promise is that “At Grace, our team is committed to making your move as stress-free as possible.” They did the complete opposite.

Interestingly, other negative reviews here have been replied to almost immediately by Grace. We’re intrigued how quickly they respond to this review. It’ll be the first time they have contacted us whatsoever.

Would not ever recommend using this company. Unless you want to make your move as stressful as possible.

They were very prompt in what they did in and out, started straight away and didn’t have a break at all for they 10 and a half hour the young fella was there packing everything up mostly by himself 100% satisfied.

Great company who had excellent customer service. Move was efficient and they have kept us well notified of the status of our shipping container.

I signed a contract with Grace to move my goods from Australia to Spain. Since I was moving to an apartment located higher than ground floor, I included difficult access charges in the contract. Once the goods arrived in Europe, a partner of Grace in The Netherlands took the process over.

Once I was in Europe, their partner sent me their booklet with the documentation they required and the service they provided. Since it was mention that their service included delivery to ground floor I wanted to confirm that in my case I had paid for delivery to a different level than ground floor. A week before delivery, I received an email saying that in my case indeed all charges were included and that I would receive my goods a week later.

However, 4 days before delivery I received an invoice mentioning that I had to pay additional difficult access charges for the amount of 500€. No kidding! I already paid for difficult access charges, I asked to confirm that it was all good, it was confirmed, and then they asked before delivery to get 500€ otherwise my goods were not going to be delivered. I asked then for a breakdown of such charges and I am still waiting for it!

While waiting for a breakdown of the extra charges - which was promised to be sent before payment - I received an email just before COB of the day before delivery saying that the goods were not going to be delivered the following day as I did not settle the invoice.

They expected me to pay something without any breakdown! I paid in a position of total defenselessness after reading such extortion and my goods got delivered 10 days later!

Highly unprofessional and very disappointing!

Moved from Adelaide to London. Good marketing, 'Australia's biggest etc'. Frankly, I normally can't be bothered to leave reviews but felt obliged to in case some other poor souls can avoid this sad experience.
Gentleman comes and gives a quote (a Mr [name removed by Sirelo])- quotes, or shall I say deliberately severely under quotes/underestimate items to fit in a 2o feet container. When they have your acceptance and money close to the move they will say your items are no way going to fit into a 20 ft container as per THEIR original quote. At this stage you are desperate and its too late to change company and they basically have you by the short and curlys. They will then charge you extortionate amount to get the job done (40% more!!). Also their packers, who were very nice, will deliberately under fill boxes so that your items do not fit into the space quoted. Should have seen in coming but I didn't as I have never had any such experience= even with their UK partners Doree Bonner who were fantastic. Gutted and left a very bitter after taste that I will remember for ever- absolutely disgusting guise for a legitimate company and nothing short of organised criminals. This sort of thing does not help the industry.

Excellent Sales consultant, good price and excellent services. I haven't received my boxes yet so I can't tell how my furnitures will be received.

The packing guys were organised and very professional. The quote was fair and the time frame for the shipping to arrive was fast.

So far so good, our items have yet to arrive in Australia But they repacked and have placed our belongings in a shopping container and they are now on a ship headed this way.

OK , the pickup was very good, top people, The office was supportive in every way. Paperwork done in my available time , no big dramas to not complete it NOW, ( huge relief with whatever else was going on ) Still to be shipped to NZ , consolidation takes time. I'm not in a hurry, so that's a bonus.

Every thing good

Unfortunately a case of over promise and under deliver.
Great communication and help during the assessment phase. Then all down hill.
Turned up 6 hours late on pack up truck day (packers the day before we very good however).
Goods arrived at destination and waited 73 days before they can deliver. Excuses made on customs but not communication was given. Had to follow up 3 times each week before a response was given which was very vague. Asked for ongoing communication so I didn’t have to chase but was never received. Had to chase for information each time.
Final straw was charged unknown and extra costs for handling and storage which was Grace’s fault for delayed delivery.

They were easy to work with and offered just what we needed, nothing was to hard.

The price is okay but the process took so long

I had a hiccup or two with them,nothing serious

Service and price

The customer care was hands on and personal... rater important when you are putting everything your worked for your whole life in their hands. They came and did an initial quote at the house and a final quote once we were sure of what we were and weren't taking. this made it easier to decide what we wanted or didn't want to take to stay in budget with our move.

Reasonably priced and professionals.

Friendly, professional service

Great team

We left everything to them as I was seriously unwell they organised the car house and pet with absolutely no stress to me even helped with paperwork...they went above and beyond to help this has been our least stressful and easiest move internationally we have ever done and were very grateful to the movers at Grace Removals

They shifted me 2014 from Australia to Hungary, Super!

Charged 6800 because I wanted a 29 foot container for exclusive use. I did not want shared fright.

Fantastic service, the whole processing was polite, honest, reliable, calm, immediate and professional. Even the packing team was a pleasure to work with. I am impressed with the accuracy of the labelling. Have relocated internationally several times, this was the best company I have used.

Pretty good - were late for pickup but overall good experience

The customer service representative who visited me was bright, bubbly, and knew what she was talking about. Very straight talker, follow up was fantastic, this company made me feel important. The day the movers arrived, they were both professional and mademe feel relaxed about packing my belongings. I felt comfortable with my choice.

Sydney office seems to have far too many people working on the one move, lots of repeated paperwork, and not the best communications, sales man was good, as was head packer, however the junior packing man who wrote the move inventory did not match this up at all to the pre supplied numbered inventory from us.....this has caused a nightmare for the receiving grace branch in NZ and for us

The final price did come in higher than expected however I am convinced that this would have happened with any of the movers.

Annoying damage like dents and chipped corners of furniture, mattress ticking rubbed off causing holes and breakage of lamps,dents on freezer top. Nothing major but enough to get under your skin.

On time, good communication, careful in handling boxes

We had no problems (as apposed our move to NZ with another company) this company was pleasant to deal with, our container arrived on the date promised & the trucking company they used were fantastic & were able to get the container into place without any hassles or fuss

The Melbourne office was fantastic. Fast, efficient service.
The Auckland office has been awful, little contact and delivery timeframe advised has been far exceeded. We have yet to receive our shipment a month after arriving in NZ

It seemed like Grace had no experience in relocating to China. Major issues with customs due to non itemised inventory, items not valued etc... Lucky I have excellent support in China from other means.

Great service, smooth removal, no issues to date

Quick and professional service

Nice and helpful staff, shipment has not arrived at destination yet.