Clark & Rose, Ltd? Think again!

Speaking of movers, if you are planning a move from Europe back to the US and are in the market for a mover (or "remover" as they are called abroad) I urge you to do your homework thoroughly, and certainly before contracting with Clark & Rose, Ltd, out of the United Kingdom.

Here's how our experience went down:

After looking through a variety of resources for a mover in Paris to ship about two dozen boxes of our household things from Paris to the US, we contacted the Paris agent of Clark & Rose, LTD. After deciding to go with this company we also opted to pay extra for insurance, covering loss or theft up to 10,000 euros. We also declared certain specific items of value, primarily my Nikon DSLR camera system that would be part of the shipment (2000 euros).

In early March two men from Clark & Rose came to pack up our things. I had put all of my digital SLR equipment into a large camera bag which was then boxed up and sealed by the movers.

That was the last time we saw it.

Our household goods arrived at my brother-in-law's home in Massachusetts not long after Susie and I had settled in northern Maine for the summer. Shortly afterwards we made a quick trip down to check on our goods and discovered that the box with all the camera equipment, as well as several other items from our kitchen, was missing.

Now before going into an explanation of what occurred after we made this discovery I should also say that when our goods were delivered they were brought by a young man from New Jersey or some such place, all shrink-wrapped, and he just left them at Dick's house. No one at no time signed for anything. In fact, had we been less scrupulous we could've have easily informed the "remover" that nothing arrived and claimed the full value of 10,000 euros.

Anyway, the fact remained that my camera equipment had indeed been "removed," permanently it seemed. And so began the long and tedious process of getting our insurance claim money from Clark & Rose.

We submitted the necessary paperwork and all the documentation within the time required. Then we waited.

And waited.

And waited.

Days went by, then weeks, which turned into months.

Finally, after nearly five months we received notification that our claim was being processed for payment. Less than two weeks later we were in receipt of the money for our claim. Of course we have no idea what conclusion the "adjusters" drew from their "investigations" into the Paris end of the story since they decided to share virtually none of that information with us.

While we are of course pleased that Clark & Rose at long last lived up to their contractual arrangement, we can only caution anyone considering hiring their services to think twice before doing so. The company repeatedly failed to respond in a timely and respectful manner to my requests as to the status of the claim. Often days would pass before I would hear a response to my inquiry about the claim's status and then it would be some assistant or another saying that the person handling the claim was "out of the office" or "in a meeting" or some other such thing and would be back to me soon. Which he rarely ever did of course.

Clark & Rose? Think again.