Customer complaints spike for SoCal moving company
LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- It was a moving nightmare for customers when those Yelp users trusted their belongings to a moving company - then their goods disappeared.
Deidre Bailey hired B&B Transportation, a cross-country mover, after a search on Yelp.
Her furniture was picked up in June, with her destination as Manhattan. Six months later, she remained without any of it.
It's a similar story for Megan Garagiola, who once worked for Eyewitness News.
ABC7 went to the company's headquarters in Sun Valley and ran into a man who Garagiola identified as the foreman for her move.
Tomer Jeddah is listed on business records as the former B&B Transportation president. He didn't answer any questions but another man listed as the current president, Gal Jeddae, said on the phone that it's severe weather causing delays for the last 60 days.
"They finally put me in contact with someone who in between expletives will then tell me my stuff is on its way to Michigan," Garagiola said.
The driver, "Ben," texted her a map that he was stuck outside Minneapolis. What Ben didn't realize was his actual location was noted at the bottom, which was Los Angeles.
The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration regulates movers. Records on its website show that in 2014, it received two complaints. In 2017, 51 complaints.
The size of B&B's fleet is one truck. More concerning is safety. Truck drivers were taken out of service 60 percent of the time after inspection. The national average is 5.5 percent.
It also turns out that the positive reviews on Yelp had been sent in from the same IP address but using different names.
As for the B&B owner, Gal Jeddae, ABC7 found no record of anyone with that name in California.
It appears, however, that our inquiries did get results. Six days after ABC7's visit to B&B, Garagiola received her goods.
A delivery crew subcontracted by B&B confirmed the cargo had been sitting in an L.A. County warehouse for nearly 60 days.
Federal regulators list multiple red flags on its website -- too late, though, for Deidre Bailey. She's replaced all her furniture and plans to sue.
