Izzy Removals

Delayed twice, they arrived four hours late, but blamed this on the previous customer for not giving an accurate contents list. Unlike any professional removals company, Izzy does not inspect the property prior to moving, and when things go wrong, they blame it on the customer. This foreshadowed all the excuses they were soon to make when things went wrong with my move.

Kosta, the company director, sounded convincing on the phone and promised they would take care of my items and treat them like their own. But the team that showed up, complaining of exhaustion and dehydration, had no mind to take their time, despite pleas to the contrary. In their haste they damaged, lost and misplaced items, all of which Kosta later had excuses for.

Loading, with the occasional smoke break, took two hours, which I assisted to speed things up. Instead of taking the sideboard doors off, they asked to use my brown tape to seal them shut, which I granted since I thought they were just asking permission to use my property. It did not occur to me this might permanently damage the laminate. Towards the end, one of the movers informed me we had to dismantle the wardrobe to get it out of the house, but wouldn’t assemble it again because it was “too difficult”. This came as a shock because I had been led to believe this sort of thing would be taken care of. He partially disassembled it, just enough to get it out of the room, but conceded it would probably be quite easy to put back together at the other end, so I assumed he would after all.

We arrived at the destination around 7pm, but before unloading anything, one of the movers confronted me about payment. He asked how I was going to pay, insisting cash would be the best option. I explained paying circa £300 in cash wasn’t feasible since there’s a daily limit on withdrawals and a bank transfer would probably be the best option. He seemed satisfied and they proceeded to unload.

I began by helping to unload but they shortly suggested it would be easier if I just stayed inside and let them do it. Sitting inside the house, there were long periods without contact, and those gaps were gradually increasing as time wore on. It took about an hour longer to unload, despite access being significantly easier. It seemed they were far more liberal with smoke breaks once they’d convinced me to stop monitoring them.

With everything unloaded they confronted me about payment again. I asked if I could just pay tomorrow since it was almost 10pm on a Saturday and we were all exhausted, but they said that was too risky and not an option for them. Further, the office was closed so paying by card was no longer an option. I tried to make a bank transfer but the app was down for weekend maintenance. With no other option, they made a call to their boss and suddenly paying by card was an option after all, and with that they left after I gave my card details with their phone.

They had not even offered to reassemble the wardrobe, perhaps because they were aware the arm left sticking out had levered against something and permanently fractured one of the support shafts, which I only noticed afterwards. Next I tried to remove my brown tape used to seal the sideboard doors shut, which left a sticky residue all over the previously immaculate façade. Later still, I noticed two items hadn’t been delivered at all.

I ordered replacements for the missing computer mouse and hockey stick. However, a few days later they found the mouse and sent it back to me, although the once pristine box had been heavily damaged in transit. I sent the replacement mouse back to Amazon, which incurred a fee and triggered a warning on my account for too many returns.

I called Kosta requesting £50 compensation, consisting of their self-imposed maximum compensation for damage of £40 plus £10 for the replacement hockey stick. Kosta refused to reimburse for the wardrobe damage because, after speaking with the movers, claimed they had heard from me I was intending to get rid of it anyway. I explained that, even if I wished to trash everything they moved, it was still their job to move it safely into the new property, regardless of my future plans for any of the items. Notwithstanding the fact that I had never expressed desire to dispose of it, it makes no sense that I expected them to reassemble it if my intention was to get rid. This reasoning was lost on Kosta who claimed it was just my word against theirs and then offered me to speak to the movers directly. Exactly what he expected us to discuss he did not say, but he might have expected us to come to an agreement as to whether or not things were really broken and whether I was going to get rid of anything. Needless to say, I refused to have such a pointless conversation and left him to speak with them.

When Kosta called me back, he conceded the movers had admitted to damaging the wardrobe, and for that reason he would grant £40 damage compensation but would not grant anything further for missing and damaged items. As for the hockey stick, they claimed they never saw one and thus were not responsible for its disappearance. When I broached the subject of sideboard damage, he sternly warned, “don’t push it”, and further added I had given permission for them to wrap it in brown tape so it was my fault it was damaged by said brown tape.

What really shocked me was how Kosta became a totally different person from before the move compared to after. Before the move he would promise me anything, including that my items would be treated like their own. After the move he tried to explain to me, in condescending tones, whenever a job like this is undertaken, in the removals business there’s always a certain amount of unavoidable damage. Notwithstanding how alarmingly negligent and patently false that claim is, it’s certainly not something he would have said prior to the move.

On several occasions Kosta claimed he had to defer decisions to “the boss”, but a quick inspection of the company registered at Companies House in the UK reveals that Kalin Kostadinov (Kosta) has been the only named director since inception in April 2016. Whilst there, I also took a look at their unaudited accounts. They made over £600 that day, from me and the previous customer, but if we round down and suppose they only make that much half of the year on average, that’s £500 x 180 days = £90K per annum. It looks like they’re only declaring about 15% of that income to the tax man and might be why they prefer payment in cash. I’m no accountant, so I might be missing something, but you can draw your own conclusions by looking up company number 10111827.

I bought some “sticky stuff remover” and tried to clean up the sideboard. I removed all of the tape, but it left permanent damage to the laminate finish where it had been scrubbed clean. Below is a final tally of the total damage offset against the reimbursement.

Sideboard … value: £249.99 … reimbursed: £0.00
Wardrobe … value: £59.99 … reimbursed: £40.00
Hockey stick … value: £9.99 … reimbursed: £0.00
Sticky Stuff Remover … value: £4.72 … reimbursed: £0.00
Mouse returned to Amazon: value: £4.00 … reimbursed: £0.00

Total damage: £328.69 … Total reimbursement: £40.00 … Total loss: -£288.69

This doesn’t take into consideration they quoted me an hourly rate of £55/hour, which is £6/hr more than the rate on their website, so I had already paid an extra £30 more than the average customer, which reduces the effective reimbursement to £10.

In summary, I could have just said what a previous Trustpilot user said before me, “Don’t use ever if you care about your items!”. She was exactly right. It is my sincere hope that by sharing this review it will save someone the same loss and stress I had to endure.

Service cost: £275

I don’t like to leave negative reviews, especially in this climate but they arrived 7 hours late. Looked around and refused to do it because it was two floors up, Even though I gave an accurate list of goods. Packed terribly in storage unit so wouldn’t fit. Next day I ordered new storage. Refused to bring stuff to new unit without paying an extra £180 on top of the money I paid for the move on the day. I refused. Currently in the process of calling the police as they are keeping my stuff against my will and now threatening to dump on the street. Kosta has lied multiple times saying he is not the manager and they will call me back. I have never received any calls from the mysterious manager who is calling the shots. I have moved 17 times over 25 years and this is without doubt the WORST moving experience/ company / service I have ever received. Would give zero stars if I could. Moving is extremely stressful anyway. Don’t be tempted by the price. It’s not worth having to go through the hell I have the past 72 hours trust me!

Move size: 1 Bedroom Flat Service cost: £240