PODS Reviews

Having them dropped on my driveway, it was a daunting task to look at them and say, "Well, I'm going to load them and all that." But it was an easy process. They were easy to load and access. They had more than enough space for me. They were clean and waterproofed. they were picked up and dropped off within the windows of time that they were requested. They accommodated me on a special request and didn't charge me. They did all the things that you would expect a great American company to do. For that, I was pretty grateful.

It's nice to see that companies like that can provide service without any hesitation to look at conditions or other things of that nature. They just provided service and they provided a superior one and it didn't matter what my condition was or their condition was. They came out, they did it, and they did it well. Their driver was outstanding. His name was Mike. There was another gentleman who stepped in one day. But anybody who was involved was extremely knowledgeable.

PODS was extremely innovative. the system that they use on the truck. I'm an old air freight guy. So back in the day, when I was loading 747s and wide bodies at Chicago O'Hare for my career, I would have loved to have one of those podzillas in a larger size to load flat beds full of MD-11 air pallets. But that is what it was. It was nice to see that and it's great to see that you're all over the country as far as PODS is concerned. But my experience is top-notch. My customer experience was in the top 1%.

I called to book the move and the first person I spoke with said the 8-foot pod would be sufficient since I was not moving appliances or bedroom furniture. I originally booked that. But after I put all my boxes together, I felt like I should have gotten the 16-foot, the longer one. He said I would be fine without appliances or bedrooms or furniture, but I had a lot of boxes and things. If I had listened to him, I would have really been messed up. When I got the 16 and loaded it, it was right at the door. I did not have room for much more. The 8-foot would have never worked. So that was somewhat of a misquote. You have to think about that when you are ordering. It depends on how many boxes a person has, and I had more than I expected. When I got to Michigan and my daughter opened the pod, she could not believe how many boxes I had. But the experience with PODS was amazing.

The drivers were very friendly and knowledgeable. When the pod was dropped off, I talked to the driver because I was concerned about the mountains between North Carolina and Virginia. He explained that I would go through a few hours of mountains, and when I googled it, it said three to five hours, so he was very knowledgeable about that. They were very friendly, courteous and excellent. Using PODS was no nonsense and a very easy transition. You do not have any problems, except maybe they need to critique the sizing better. I asked about a third size, but they said it was not available in North Carolina. I needed the 16-foot, and it worked out well.

My drivers were all great and I really liked them. They called and let me know when they were coming, and that way I could have people out of the way when I first left. And when I got here, the driver told me to give him a call by 3 o'clock if I was ready to have the pod picked up. And I didn't know that I would, but I did. So, that was pretty cool and he handled it from there.

I got 16-footer pod. I took my essentials and a few big things like the table, loveseat, and recliner. But I got my tools and stuff like that in there, together with boxes, clothes, and other things. As far as the billing goes, if I don't receive any more bills, I'm close to whatever amount they initially told me. I got a discount when I started and the total cost was pretty fair for what I did. I ended up leaving my stuff in the pod longer than I thought I was going to and it just stayed at the town right next to Lowell. I'd recommend PODS to somebody else. But if you just want to move your stuff, you got to pack it and you got to take care of your stuff yourself in the pod.

I decided to go with a 16-foot pod and an 8-foot pod. One of each. We had a little trouble with the door on the big pod. It was really sticky. We could get it to work eventually. But that was the only trouble that I had. As far as cleanliness, I wasn't putting my furniture into my new house. It’s a travel container. I didn't expect it to be immaculate. It wasn't dirty, because, obviously, been used before, but it was clean.

The delivery was tricky. I had ordered the 16-foot pod. I actually had quite a lengthy conversation with the person on the phone about where they were gonna put it because my house was on a hill. Not a great, big, huge hill, but a hill, nonetheless. They had to drive up the hill, and right at the top of the hill, before you could drive back to where the garage was, there was an electric gate. It's an older neighborhood. I went through that very clearly with the guy on the phone. I said, “Are you sure you can bring that here?” The guy said it was no problem and asked wow wide was the driveway.

So, then the driver got there with the pod. I had been talking to someone, probably in another state, about the way my driveway was, but I was very clear about it, what he didn't tell me was how much clearance was required on each side of the driveway. And my driveway was within two and a half feet of the side of my house and that wasn't enough room. He said, “Can you drive through the gate?” I said, “Yeah. No problem.” But, that gate wasn't big enough for that equipment to get through there. So, the driver was standing down in the street, scratching his head, saying, “This is not gonna work.” And explained to me why. I said, “Okay. Why can't you just leave it right here in front of the house? I'm in the street.” He said, “We can in some areas, but not in this town. We have to get a permit.” I said, “How long does that take?” He said, “It depends. It could take three or four weeks.” I said, “No. This has to happen today.”

They dropped them off on July 25th of last year. I loaded everything up. Everything went to California. PODS weren't the problem. The problem was the person that I went out to California with. This was supposed to be my final destination, was supposed to be California. But I got there, and there wasn't room in anybody's imagination for my stuff, where this person was living.

Now, the plan was to find a bigger house. I'm already looking. I was there from the 1st of August until the 1st of February of this year. And during that time frame, every time I would find a house, I'd say, “What about this one? This one's great. It's this big. It's got a two-car garage. And the rent is the right number.” But he'd say, “No. That one's too close to other houses. That one doesn't have any trees in the yard.” There was always something he said, which didn't take me long to figure out. This means we're not moving. And we're in a man cave. We're in an 850-square-foot half of a duplex, and I had just moved out of a 1,800-square-foot house. My math says that isn't going to work. So, I had to leave everything in storage with PODS. But then, when it came time, I said, “I can't do this. I'm gonna have to move.”

It was not that bad a process. All I had to do was call PODS and say, “Whenever you can, I want you to ship those two pods to Beaverton, Oregon or the closest town to Beaverton. If you don't have a PODS facility there, just somewhere close to Beaverton or Portland. And do it right away because I'm heading that direction. And as soon as I get there, I'm gonna find a place. I'm gonna have them deliver the pods to that place. I'm gonna unload, and I'm gonna continue my life.” And that's what happened. It was really simple. I got out of California.

They've always encouraged us to go to the website and use MyPODS.com and log in to my account. That's fine and dandy, but it didn't allow for the kind of flexibility that I needed. When I got to California, I had them get my pod down. I went over there, and I got a few things out of the big pod because my few things that were in there that I really needed were my clothes, ‘cause all I took was a small suitcase for the trip. I got a lot of my clothes out of there, and then they sealed it back up. I was manipulating both of the pods. At one time, I had them bring the smaller pod over to that duplex and drop it off. We unloaded everything from it, because what it had in it was yard furniture. I thought, “Well, we could put that in the yard. And I don't have to pay storage for it.” I had that delivered, and that's what we did.

I live in Nevada, and my son was the one down there. But the neighbor's Ring camera had filmed it, and it was in an area that has an HOA. They were doing street work. I was concerned about all that. When they came to pick up here, the young man was very helpful. When they dropped it off here, they were very helpful because they needed to tilt it to get the door open. They explained that if they had to break the door open, it would cost me 800 dollars. But they were able to tilt it, and we were able to open the door with no damage to the pot. And the guy that picked it up was a nice young man. I have a super long driveway with gates, and they had no problem getting in and out safely. The pod was dropped off on the 7th in Arizona, picked up on the 12th, delivered here in Nevada the 21st, and picked up the 26th. It was a fast and positive experience.

I asked them, "Did you put it on a train?" The driver said they drove it, and I was shocked. They drove it from the Phoenix area to Reno, and it was all straightforward. They did exactly what they said they would do. My son knows how to pack stuff, so nothing was damaged or broken. I would recommend PODS to anybody who has the ability to have it loaded and unloaded, and if you have their big units. It's a super easy way to go. It made an unpleasant task easy.

Ultimately, a person named George came on the line and identified himself as a supervisor. He was useless. He didn't explain why my pods delivery had been rescheduled at the last minute. He refused to contact other drivers to see if they would deliver the pod. He refused to contact his supervisor indicating that his supervisor didn't take phone calls. He refused to contact the warehouse to see what other arrangements could be made. He refused to explain why other customers would get their deliveries before mine.

I explained that my wife was undergoing a very serious surgery and that I detrimentally relied on Pods promise to deliver the pod on May 16th. That I needed the time to clear a space in the house to make room for a medical grade bed and other medical equipment. That unless Pods was willing to make the situation right that Pods was interfering with other scheduled deliveries and was in fact interfering with my ability to prepare the house for my wife's difficult recovery. I was on the phone with George requesting that he do something to help out, I reasoned with him, pleaded with him, and begged him to help. All he would do is say he understood and that he was sorry. Yet he took no positive action to help me or my wife. I explained that I would have to write a detailed review of the company's refusal to help.