From: Muzamil Khan
Sent: Monday, December 04, 2006 1:50 PM
To:
Michael Cody
Cc: Heather West
Subject: RE: Reference
I am writing this letter of appreciation in great gratitude
for Meridian Worldwide Transportation.
I recently moved from Dubai, UAE to Newark, California.
I had hired a local UAE shipping company to do only Door to Port
service, meaning pack all household stuff, put it into a 20 foot
container and ship it to Oakland port (nearest incoming port to
Newark).The reason of not going for Door to Door shipment was the
difference in cost. I thought I could outsmart the local shipping
company by doing all the necessary stuff of custom clearance,
transportation, unloading and unpacking myself in California. I
could not have been more wrong.
Once I started looking into the process of getting my 20 feet
container out of the port and transported to my house I realized I
needed professional help, fast. Port & Custom clearance is no joke.
With destination port charges payable to the shipping line (this is
one detail the shipper in UAE had very conveniently forgot to
mention to keep his quote low!!), Custom clearance with X-ray exams,
physical exam and what not that goes on inside a huge port like
Oakland. Besides I still needed to find a transportation company who
can basically pick up my container, put it on the trailer and
transport it to Newark. Maybe the trucking company would not unload.
This means hiring movers also.
In the end faced with all these finer details I just picked up
yellow pages apprehensively and started calling moving companies who
could help me. I got a few quotes to get a baseline of what cost I
am looking at and then just opted to go for Meridian Worldwide as
they were located in Newark.
From the very first minute that I met Heather West (Meridian
International Services Manager) I knew I was going to be ok. In no
time she got all the paperwork together, I signed and it was that
easy. I was well informed at every stage of what was happening with
my shipment. I did not put down any money or give any Credit Card
numbers. Whatever charges for shipping line and Custom clearance
accumulated beyond the agreed quote by Meridian, were dealt with
promptly by them.
I even ran into a big issue of having my house in Newark painted
before I moved in. Meridian was helpful in every way to accommodate
these kinds of last minute changes. And also figure out how to save
cost on delaying releasing of my container from port. Meridian could
have very easily taken me for a ride by having my container released
quickly. And unloaded into their own storage first and then later on
reload and unload at my house. What they call as double handling.
But Meridian did not. In fact Heather worked through all the
scenarios to see which one would save me money.
And one final Monday morning I had all my stuff unloaded and
placed as I wanted, by very fast and courteous movers from Meridian.
Now on hindsight I think about all the emotional stress that I
simply did not have to cope with. I did not have to worry about the
finer details of all that was required to finally have all my
household stuff back with me.
The most wonderful thing that happened was that I just picked
Meridian Worldwide from the yellow pages. I did not have any
reference or any clue how they are. They could have treated me as a
one time opportunity also. As frankly speaking International moving
is once in a blue moon experience and there is no concept, perhaps,
of repeat customership. But Meridian treated me with as much care,
respect and importance as if I was a big corporate customer.
So thanks once again to Heather West and Meridian Worldwide for
making me feel like I was your most valuable customer. And saving me
from the agony of doing everything myself.
Muzamil J. Khan
Newark, CA
USA.
