Britannia Lanes

Firstly I must praise the crew on our move from Devon to Hampshire. They were everything that the office should have been and wasn't - cheerful, happy, efficient, good at their jobs. The office staff were a disaster zone - adding on extra charges after the contract was agreed - including one for delivering on a later day than had been requested!. We were also joined with another move without advising us, or offering a discount. Staff were slow to respond and rude. I have used Britannia on multiple occasions in the UK, Europe and North America, but not this office before which I was bitterly disappointed with.

Move size: 4 Bedroom Home Service cost: £4000

We recently had to arrange removal of some items, including a piano, from the north of Scotland to Truro. Every step of the way Britannia Lanes were extremely helpful, accommodating and very professional. The collection was from my parents house, so there was a third party involved and the guys contacted my parents to advise on collection plans, arrival times etc. My parents reported that the guys collecting our stuff were lovely and certainly, the two men who came to deliver our items were fantastic, very efficient and professional. I would highly recommend and would use again.

Service cost: £900

Do not use this company. The labelling of boxes was very poor (it took 2 days to find pots and pans and 3 days to find our cutlery after move) Our move was supposed to be on a Friday, but when you get a full day’s pay at double rates for coming back on Saturday for 3 hours work, it’s not surprising that they ran out of time and left us in our new house with only a bed then came back Saturday to unload the rest of the house ( at an extra £400 over and above the original signed contract!)I can prove nothing, but a large sum of money disappeared during the move. There is no mention of this review company on their website but they claim 5 gold stars of approval from another company, and decline to allow me to comment using that company (it might spoil the 5 star rating). No apologies from the managing director. Only self justification. I would not recommend this company to my worst enemy.

Move size: 3 Bedroom Home Service cost: £1355

Awful company which doesn't even deserve one star. I experienced numerous problems including poor staff attitudes, contradictory information (phone versus in writing) and then to top it all blaming me the customer for the issues. Despite a four page complaint the director still denied any wrong-doing and colluded with his staff.

Avoid this company as there are far better removal companies available who have reliable, accurate and polite staff and handle complaints far better.

Move size: 2 Bedroom Home Service cost: £1794

Guy arrived on Wednesday to box all none big items, very nice fella, his apprentice (my 5 year old daughter) was assisted by him really well, and he was hugely patient with her. Friday same guy with his work mate were back on time. They did a fantastic job in moving us out of old house and heading to new house (5 miles). Again unloaded extremely efficient and had everything in house, laid out in the correct places, some really heavy stuff, but nothing was a problem, and the still had the apprentice!!
Can't speak highly enough of these guys, they were exceptionally good and a credit to the company, these are the people who make a company!!

Service cost: £1100

We had a professional home visit from the Britannia Lanes surveyor and what I felt to be a reasonable quote. I accepted the quote in writing and asked to be forwarded the documentation for signing, after BL confirmed our packing and move dates were available and had been booked in to the diary. A week later I had still not received the details so chased them up, as we were by then 10 days away from our packing date, and was told a mistake had been made and they had double-booked and so were cancelling us. The person on the phone clearly wasn't bothered and did not attempt to find any solution for us. So, 9 days ahead of our move I had to get new quotes in, which was extremely stressful. I wish I had read the negative reviews of Britannia Lanes before I contracted them. Do not use this firm - there are many far more professional organisations out there!

Service cost: £3500

Would not recommend this company for overseas shipment. We were quoted 12 weeks door to door. We followed the timeline suggested by the "expert" movers to the day. Our goods were collected on 20th March and were received by us at our Australian residence 5 days ago. 5 months door to door. After the collection of goods I heard absolutely nothing from Britannia Lanes, one would assume this was a good thing. However, I called them 72 days in to gather information about the agents on the Australian leg of the shipment, only to be casually told that our consignment was still in storage in Exeter (!!?) and wasn't even allocated to a ship yet. No one felt I should be contacted to inform me that the time schedule organised would not be met. I was told that not so many ships were destined for Melbourne, (they didn't know why, perhaps Brexit!) hence the delay. I found this unacceptable. I contacted other overseas shipping companies and they could not verify this theory as they were not experiencing this "slow down" and the term "someone's dropped the ball" pretty much summed up the situation. For a company that was supposed to have access to "fastest shipping lanes with a reliable, scheduled timetable that allows you to plan ahead with confidence" (as quoted from Britannia Lanes of Devon website) service so far was unacceptable and disappointing. If they held their hands up to making a mistake and apologised it would have sat with me much better. However, what I found even more exasperating was the attitude and incompetence from various members of office staff, and in particular the MD, who was uncommunicative- no business email or telephone number could be given to me (??!) and he found it acceptable to not return a call or email for over one week. When he did reply, he was misinformed, defensive and, I felt, aggressive. According to citizens advice I was entitled to consequential loss, I wanted money to not have to re-buy the essentials;towels, duvets and pillows, cutlery and crockery as I chose to send what we had, and borrow items in England until we departed. Mr Lane would not accept this and battled me. He made my experience (at this already stressful time) of moving my young family with a 2yr old and 4year old to the other side of the world very anxious and stressful. My children went without their toys and most familiar belongings for 5 months. For a family run company to be heartless about this is wrong and I feel they don't deserve business from families.
Other incompetences included declaration paperwork and photographs of declared items incomplete. Apparently it was my fault a declared knife was not packed and labelled separately for inspection through quarantine and all glass items that were shipped arrived broken. Comments from the guys unpacking our consignment this end suggested that the packing wasn't effective to withstand the journey. I somehow have to muster up the energy to process an insurance claim.
This process has been by far the most stressful and expensive of our whole move. If your business is to work with families during very big and emotional changes, your service should be much much better than this.

Service cost: £3000

I used Brittania Lanes as they had moved my house contents previously from France to Exeter satisfactorily. The actual removal men were excellent and efficient, but - when they turned up to remove the contents of my house to take into storage, I could tell immediately that the Luton van was too small. The men had not been told and had to do two trips rather than one, seriously mucking up their schedules. When I telephoned the company to organise the furniture to be returned, I mentioned the fact I needed a bigger van. I was speaking to the director, Mr. Lane. He got very belligerent, saying his men knew they needed two trips. All he had to do was apologise and admit there'd been a mistake in communication, but instead he blamed his employees by effectively saying they were lying. Bad customer care Mr. Lane, you really annoyed a happy customer and need to go on a course in anger management and customer relations.

Service cost: £1200