With warmer months comes the household moving season, a time when consumers are more frequently victimized by dishonest and unlicensed companies, warns the Council of Better Business Bureaus and the American Moving & Storage Association.

Among the common complaints are that a mover: 1) refuses to release household possessions; 2) has added unexpected charges; 3) has disappeared with customers’ belongings; 4) refuses to respond to complaints about lost or damaged items; or 5) never shows up on moving day.

You can avoid some of these problems by doing your homework before hiring a mover.

• Check for complaints at the BBB, and by doing a basic Web search using the name of the company and such words as “ripoff” and “complaints.”
• For interstate carriers, look for additional complaints and verify registration by visiting the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) website.
• Read the advice on the federal site, including a list of frequently asked questions, as well as on the American Moving and Storage Association website.
• Avoid any company that provides an estimate online or over the phone without visiting your home. Get at least three in-home estimates, and be suspicious of unrealistically low-price offers.

• Check for complaints at the BBB, and by doing a basic Web search using the name of the company and such words as “ripoff” and “complaints.”
• For interstate carriers, look for additional complaints and verify registration by visiting the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) website.
• Read the advice on the federal site, including a list of frequently asked questions, as well as on the American Moving and Storage Association website.
• Avoid any company that provides an estimate online or over the phone without visiting your home. Get at least three in-home estimates, and be suspicious of unrealistically low-price offers.

If you have trouble with a mover, file a complaint with the BBB and local law enforcement.

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Kudos to the investigating team that instigated the downfall of crooks who prey on the vulnerability of the general public. Moving is such a stressful time as it is and to have unscrupulous operators adding to anxiety is just unacceptable. It makes me wonder though why it has taken Toronto so long to bring forth this rampant problem. Desi Movers and their aliases have been operating for the past eight years, but what about their predecessors? This is no new problem and one not limited to ethnic operators.

I was a victim when I was extremely new to the city some 30 years ago, moving from a downtown apartment to North York. Money was tight and obviously one shops around for the best deal. When I landed this moving company, they sounded very professional so I booked them. On moving day, they arrived almost half a day late and behaved with rudeness upon arrival. They had a laid-back attitude and did not care that I only had a few more hours of light left. They showed their true colours when I arrived at my new apartment. They casually leaned back on their moving van, lighting up cigarettes. When I asked them if they could possibly hurry up, I was informed it would cost another $800 and they wanted all of it upfront. Obviously I was shocked at the callous behaviour and refused; they said they would take the furniture back downtown and leave it by the roadside. Obviously these people were veterans at their game who had the art of conning and defrauding innocents down pat, and they did not have glamorous ethnic backgrounds. They were a couple of Caucasian crooks, plain and simple.

This taught me one big lesson in acquiring services: do your research, and then some. Talk to previous clients, check with the Better Business Bureau and do not discount the power of networking within your circle of friends, family and colleagues.

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Desi Movers and its 18 aliases are currently out of business.

Their trucks have been impounded, their offices raided and their owners arrested.

Syed Altaf Hussain, the 57-year-old Scarborough businessman behind the complaint-plagued moving company spent last night in police custody while his two sons, four of his drivers and their dispatcher sat in cells nearby.

Police have issued a warrant for the arrest of a fifth driver connected with the company.

In total, they face 160 charges including numerous counts of fraud under $5,000, extortion, possession of proceeds of crime and mischief.

The arrests are the culmination of “Project Overhaul” — a three-month investigation led by Toronto police Det. Kevin Hooper who said “this is the beginning of the end” of an alleged criminal enterprise that posed as a moving company for the last eight years.

A Toronto Star investigation first drew public attention to Desi Movers and its various aliases in August 2008. The complaints uncovered by the Star mirror those that led two dozen police officers to descend on the company’s Scarborough business address and on the residences of its principals Thursday morning.

In its investigation, the Star found more than 30 people alleged they were taken advantage of by the movers.

The Star also discovered that the company changed its name in order to distance itself from the complaints. But with every new name came new complaints and they all sounded the same.

The movers would quote a very low cost to clients who responded to their ads in local newspapers or on the internet.

The company would ask for a deposit up front, then, halfway through the job, it was alleged would double or even triple the costs. If a client refused to pay the increase, the company would allegedly threaten to hold their belongings in a company storage locker.

One client, Chris Brown, was told it would cost $500 to move 200 metres from one Port Credit apartment to the other. But once the truck was loaded the price jumped to $1,500.

“All of my worldly possessions were on their truck, right down to my toothbrush,” said Brown. “I felt I was being ransomed just to get it all back.”

Toronto police fraud detectives issued a public warning about Desi Movers and one of its aliases, Indo-Pak Movers, last November. At that time, police said they were investigating 17 complaints against the companies.

Hooper inherited that investigation in February and said he has since spoken to 15 people with complaints in 2010 alone.

In one recent case, Hooper said, a Haitian couple was allegedly forced to go to an ATM machine and withdraw their last dollar to pay for the rising costs involved with what was supposed to be a $300 move. Police said the movers then jettisoned the couple’s belongings onto the street and drove away.

In the Star’s investigation, many victims said they had been frustrated by police inaction during their moves. In some cases, victims called police who showed up during the moves but did not intervene because the company’s contract stated — in small print — that excess charges might apply.

“At face value it looks like a civil dispute,” Const. Tony Vella said Thursday of the initial inaction. “But it’s a lot more complicated than that.”

Police now say customers were subjected to bully tactics to hand over money.

Police say they receive numerous complaints about a number of moving companies in the city.

“We focused on one particular crew and it all started with the dad,” Hooper said of the investigation into Desi Movers.

Police allege that the father — Syed Altaf Hussain — trained his two sons, who branched out and operated their own numbered companies but always out of the same address.

That Munham Gate address near Birchmount and Ellesmere Rds. was empty Thursday afternoon. The sign above the door was half torn down.

It was there in 2008 that a Star reporter first met Arif Adnan Syed, Hussain’s 27-year-old son and owner of 13 of the company’s 19 aliases.

Syed said none of the companies were related and advised the reporter to get off his property or “there will be trouble.”

The Star returned to the company’s headquarters shortly after its initial investigation was published and watched as Hussain instructed his drivers to paint over the Desi Movers signage on the side of their trucks.

The Star last spoke with Syed in November after police issued a public warning about the company. At that time he said: “The main problem isn’t me, it’s the public. It doesn’t matter whatever you publish, people are so cheap.

“If I change my name today and put $2 less on the hourly rate they will still come to me.”

Syed was arrested at his home on Beckinridge Dr. in Markham Thursday morning. Police have since impounded his 2004 Audi.

Hussain was arrested at his subsidized housing residence on Kennedy Rd. His 2001 Mercedes-Benz has also been impounded.

Police have also seized 13 moving trucks belonging to the company and more than $20,000 in cash.

Police allege the accused were netting a profit of $1 million a year, yet some were still claiming welfare.

Charged are Syed Altaf Hussain, 57, owner of Elizabeth Movers, Comfortable Movers and Masters Movers and Storage. Also charged are Hussain’s sons Arif Adnan Syed, 27, (owner of Desi Movers, Dynamic Movers, Dynamite Movers, Family Movers, Indo-Pak Movers, Master Movers, Supreme Movers, and Pacific Van Lines Moving Inc., etc.) and Syed Amit Monwar Hussain, 29, (owner of Xpress Movers and A1 Xpress Moving Inc.). The companies’ dispatcher, Vanessa Longhurst, 38, has also been charged as have four of the companies’ drivers: Syed Tamim Rejw Hussain, 25, Clyde Alen Muffty, 34, Scott Paul Slater, 31, and Joseph Lima, 22.

Police have issued a warrant for the arrest of a fifth driver, Jimmy Roland Veilleux, 35.

The accused are scheduled to appear at College Park courthouse Friday morning.

company, mover, movers, moving, singapore

company, mover, movers, moving, singapore