Having your car transported across the country is a stressful thing, for both parties involved. The owner is giving up their vehicle and money while the driver is laying their time, space, and their reputation on the line. Besides the worry of your vehicle getting damaged or, on the driver’s side, being responsible for damages, there are plenty other of hardships that come to transporting a vehicle and we are here to shine some light on them.
Finding the Right Company
For a customer, this can be one of the more time-consuming tasks you have to do throughout the whole process, especially if you are new to ever transporting a vehicle. You have to find the right auto transport company that will give you a decent price point, they have to have the service that best suits your vehicle, have enough safety features on their carrier so you feel safe leaving your vehicle with them, have a reputation of picking up and delivering on time, give great communication and updates, and are not a pain to deal with on the phone or in person. Finding an auto transport company that can cover all this may seem impossible, but there are a few, though then you will have to choose which of the best you should go with, which then becomes a difficult task. Patience is the needed for this portion of transporting your car.
But now let’s say that you are someone who has a truck and wants to work for an auto transport company. Doing your research will take just as much time, if not longer than a customer because you want to be really sure about the company you are going to be working for. You are going to want to look for how much business a company gets, have they been around long enough (10+ years at least), and is that company considered cheap to customers or do they charge more because they require drivers to have or to get more safety features on their carriers. Though more safety features require more work, this means that a company is more professional and will likely pay more.
Loading and Unloading
This is usually more stressful for the driver since the vehicle’s owner is there while they load and unload their vehicle. During this process, the owner is nervous, waiting and hoping that their vehicle is properly put into place onto the carrier. The driver has to take their time and triple check that everything is where it has to be while having the owner behind them the whole time, so the pressure is on. However, with a more experienced company, this feeling should be reduced between both parties because the owner knows that the auto transport company has done the loading and unloading aspect thousands of times. A more experienced driver will not feel the pressure because they know what they are doing.
The Drive
During transport, that is where many customers being to worry about their vehicle, regardless if they have had their vehicle transported before. The driver, if they secured their vehicles correctly, does not worry much about any damages, especially if they are using an Enclosed car carrier since they loaded the vehicle safely and don’t ever touch it unless they need to move it out of the way of another vehicle or unload it to a delivery location. As a customer, you can call the auto transport company you booked with to give you an update on your vehicle’s location and condition, and they should gladly do that for you. However, do not bombard them with a bunch of calls because then it will become an annoyance. An auto transport company transports more than just one vehicle, so they get multiple calls asking for updates and would appreciate no more than 5 calls for an update if you are going across the country. Allow the auto transport company to give you a call and update you on a regular basis if you are concerned about your vehicle, just let them know that you would like to have frequent updates, so they can write that on your file, so they can take care of your needs.
Damages
In the case of any damages, it will definitely result in a lot of anger and headaches from both parties. Though this is rare, damages do occur at times and can be a result of negligence from either driver or owner. Check out our blog on ‘Damages‘ to see what course of action you should take as a driver or customer and to determine whose fault the damages were on, so you can deal with insurances easier.
Those are the main headaches and hardships that come with auto transporting, but if you are an auto transport company, experience will surely help you. As a customer, patience will help, as well as transporting your vehicle multiple times. We do not recommend changing who you transport with unless they did not serve you right at all, delivered a damaged vehicle, or was unprofessional throughout the process.
