To Whom It May Concern

Topic: Desi Movers and Syed Arif Adnan (Jason)

On May 2008, I contacted “Desi Movers” from the Yellow pages ad and spoke with Jason. He quoted me $50/hour for 2 people and a truck. I mentioned I have a piano, he said he would charge $150 extra for it. I was moving from Scarborough to Pickering (27Km). He said it would take 5-6 hours and 1 hour extra travel time (because I do not have heavy furniture). We agreed over phone.

On June 17, 2008, 2 guys arrived named Moses and Kenny around 9:30am and asked for $400 as a deposit before they start. We gave them the money and collected a receipt (attached). They moved few things slowly to the truck and then charged $500 for the piano. We started arguing as $150 was agreed with Jason. I called Jason, he said he can not do anything, give the money to the guys and hung up on me. I called back several times and he did not pick up the phone. We were stuck in tough situation, so we paid the money. They continued moving very slowly. Around 2pm when our goods were all in the truck, Moses demanded another $500, unless he would not move the truck. We were shocked and did not know what to do, I wanted to call the police. Moses said if I call the police, they would not come as it is a civil case. I was so frustrated that I called “Dynamic Mover” from our community newspaper and talked with a guy named Altaf Hussain and described the situation. He said he will arrange a truck and call me back. While waiting for a call from Altaf Hussain, Jason called me and asked “If I contacted Dynamic Mover, Dynamic is their people so give the money to Moses and get your goods in the new place”. I had no choice, ran to the bank and got another $500 for them.

So, before they moved in my new place, which is only a 27km, I paid them ($400+500+500=1,400).

They reached the new place after an hour (when it took us only 30min.) and parked their truck a few houses down when they should park in front of our garage door. Moses came with a final bill of $2,563.35(attached, so far we paid $1,400 cash); if $1,163.35 is not paid they are not going to unload the truck. We were so shocked and had no energy left to fight back. It was already 4pm, my husband is a blood pressure patient and he carries a disability licence. It was so much for him to take (he was already extremely tried by helping them upload the truck), He started feeling so sick, and I was so worried that he could collapse. While I was thinking about where I can get help, Moses came and threatened me “if you do not pay me now, I will take all your goods to our storage and come later to collect and will cost you a lot”. My husband said pay them as my husband was feeling so nervous and he looked very pale. Again He ran to the bank and got the rest $. They unloaded the truck and asked us to work with them as we wasted so much of their time on arguing and fighting. Moses and Kenny were so cruel and so rude, we requested them to put boxes inside the house but they dumped those in the garage. I spent a lot of time labelling those boxes.

They finished unloading (dumping in the garage) within an hour and in the process damaged my piano. As they left around 5:30 in the afternoon, they were laughing and singing so loud, making us feel stupid and foolish.

While we were helping them upload and unload the truck, Kenny mentioned he dose not like to do this cheating job everyday but they are well paid. They have 2 bosses Robert and Jason.

They forced us to pay $2,500 for my small move. They damaged my piano which will cost me $1,000.

This is a crime and we ask for justice. If these hoodlums are free to go today, they will be more powerful to damage innocent people’s goods and money, because they will know, these people would not get justice.

After seeing an advertisement in the Toronto Star, on Friday, July 3, 2009, I, Lenea Grace, telephoned Pacific Van Lines Moving at (416) 999-6577 and spoke to a man on the phone about a moving quote.  I explained that I needed movers for 2 pm on Sunday, July 5 and that I would be moving from a 1-bedroom apartment to a 3rd floor bachelor apartment approximately 3 km away from the original apartment.  The man quoted me at $40/hour plus a one-time fee of $40 for their travel time.  This would include all moving expenses and the labour of two moving men.  He also said it would take 2-3 hours maximum.  So, he had given me a maximum quote of $160 plus tax. I asked if there would be a deposit and he said no. I wrote all of this down.

On Sunday, July 5, 2009, two movers from Pacific Van Lines Moving named Joseph and Michael showed up in a beat-up van with no logo on the sides.  They asked for a $350 deposit in cash before they would begin to work.  I also signed a contract at this time and learned there would be more fees than the original quote had stated: a minimum of 4 hours labour  (totaling $160) and a stairs charge of $20 per mover per flight per location (totaling $80).  None of the other extra charges applied to me.  At that time, my quote was raised to $280 plus tax.

The movers were slow and took about 1.5 hours of smoking breaks in total.  They scratched my walls and my furniture, often ripping large chunks of paint of both walls and furniture.

Before we drove to the new location, the movers presented me with a bill for $747.50.  I was shocked and asked about all the charges on the bill:

Labour: $240 (Charged for 4 hours of labour PLUS two hours of travel time)

Travelling cost: $40

Stair charge: $160 (Overcharged by $80)

Heavy item: $80 (There were no items over 50 kg as stated in the contract)

Kilometers: $30

Misc:  $100 (They claimed this was for the “long walk” from my apt to the parking lot.  My apt is in front of the elevator which lands in the front foyer which opens directly in front of the parking lot.  In total, it is about a 5-meter walk).

They told me to phone their boss at 416-999-6577 and so I did.  I calmly expressed my concern at the outrageous charges that did not match my quote or the contract.  The man on the phone told me he was the manager but when I asked him to correct and remove some of the charges he informed me that “it is Sunday and I can’t do anything about it. Take it to court”.  I asked for his name and he hung up on me.

At that time all of my belongings were in the van.  I had no other way of moving my things, so I told them I was paying under protest and paid the remaining balance.  I gave them $400 and the moving men did not have the $2.50 change to give me.

When we got to my new apartment at 448 Shaw Street, the movers told me that there would be ANOTHER $120 charge to move my belongings up the stairs.  I refused to pay.  Then they unloaded all of my things onto the sidewalk.  I asked them why they were refusing to do their job that I had already paid them to do.  They told me “their boss wouldn’t let them”.  Then Michael looked at me and said, “Bitch I’m from the ghetto.  I don’t give a shit”.  Then they drove off, leaving me with all of my things on the sidewalk.

This is ridiculous.  The service was sub-par, rude, and wrecked most of my furniture.  It was truly daylight robbery.

When I researched this “business” on the Internet after this horrible incident, I learned that this company is licensed under the business number 1715130 Ontario Inc. and has gone under many names, like Desi Movers or Dynamic Movers in addition to Pacific Van Lines Moving.  There was an article in the Toronto Star on August 15, 2008 about the same company scamming people, and yet, the very same company advertised in the Star just two weeks ago.  I will be contacting the Toronto Star as soon as possible.

I would like to be reimbursed for all charges, as this was a complete waste of my money and time, as well as proven false advertising and a breach against the Consumer Protection Act.

Note of December 5th, 2009: I have been threatened with a Libel & Slander Claim by Northern Gate and Jim McCarthy for apparently writing here what I believe to be truthful statements relating to my experience in trying to deal with Northern Gate and Jim McCarthy. They have also attempted to shut me up by demanding this post be removed from this site without providing a shred of evidence to support their demand. I do not apologize for anything I have written here as I believe or believed at the time the statements were made they were fair comment and truthful in their nature. I have shown below items which I think are relevant to the accusations they have made against me in this colour. I think it rather unfortunate that they would rather turn this into a pissing contest that simply pick up a telephone or knock on the door and look to settle outstanding matters in a professional and business like manner. Better still, reimburse me for services I have paid for and which were never provided since I had advised them in March of 2009 that I fully intended on making my thoughts on the issues expressed here available on the internet!

January 14th, 2010 – It has been 396 Days since advising Northern Gate in writing of some 16 SIXTEEN concerns I had. Since that date they have done what they usually do about at least 12 of these concerns – ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!

January 14th, 2010 – It has now been a week since I called the property Manager at Northern Gate to ask that he look into a terrible smell coming from the drains in all three of the bathrooms and to inquire as to why some residents in the community get their driveways shoveled clean and others do not! The response from Northern Gate as of this date has been once again, to do ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!

By the way, have you got an extra $50,000.00 more less to throw away? Should you, for any reason, other than death, decide that you made an error in judgement in choosing Northern Gate and decide to “sell” your life lease, $50,000.00 would be the approx. cost of getting out assuming that you sold your life lease for $350,000.00 which would be calculated as $350,000.00 x 10% to Northern Gate (This is what they charge to change the ownership record of your Life Lease in their files unless of course they choose to buy you out themselves – I have been advise by at least one resident that their fee alone is now 15%) and add say 5% to your Realtor would be a total $350,000.00 x 15% = $52,500.00 plus GST on your Realtor’s Fees and I would assume Northern Gate’s Fee as well.

This post simply states our experience at Northern Gate Retirement Community in Stouffville, Ontario. You might want to consider some or all of this when thinking of making a purchase there.

We made arrangements to lease a home at Northern Gate in early 2008 with the intention of possibly purchasing if we found everything to our satisfaction.

Negotiations were conducted through Northern Gate’s Realtor. It should be noted here that none of the homes at Northern Gate are really for sale. What you’re getting is a “Lifetime Lease” as opposed to actually owning the property.

Consider:

We leased a property, the sale of which closed in September 2007.

Since September 2007 not one single effort has been made to apply a finish coat of paint to the outside of the patio doors in spite of the fact that there are painters seen on the site at least twice a week during good weather.

It took over a year to repair the doors which warped leading from the kitchen to the patio and even then we were advised the repairs likely will not last. We were led to believe (by their door repair people) at this time that the doors and windows used in these home are of the cheapest quality available. Now the door lites are warped!

Northern Gate are responsible for the ownership, repair and or replacement of all appliances as well as landscaping and snow removal.

In spite of complaints about the Dishwasher between March, 2007 & June 2009 not one single effort was made to correct or replace it. In fact it took over 9 months before Northern Gate even bothered to have Bart’s Appliances of Stouffville look at it which resulted in 2 completely different stories.

Bart’s Appliances advised us that the Dishwasher could not wash dishes. He went so far as to say he had installed a seven year old whirlpool dishwasher for another of his clients that did a better job at cleaning dishes than ours ever could. He also stated that he would try to resolve the issue by getting a new set of brains for it ASAP.

Of course, Bart’s Appliances has never as of the date of this posting ever called back. Furthermore Bart’s advised Northern Gate behind our back that there is nothing wrong with and of course Northern Gate don’t want to replace or repair it. But this is only one of example of how these liars operate.

In spite of a call made to Bart’s Appliances to explain his deceit, to this date he has failed to return the call. Perhaps, one might want to think twice or more before dealing which such an appliance firm.

So, after some 15 months We finally called GE who made the Dishwasher. They never authorized Bart’s Appliance to do a service call and had never had a report from Northern Gate that there was even anything wrong with it. To GE’s credit, they arranged to have the Dishwasher replaced & upgraded free of charge – NO THANKS TO NORTHERN GATE who during that time could not be bothered to even so much as lift a finger to make a telephone call to GE.

None of the closets in the bedrooms are deep enough to actually hang clothes without having them constantly rubbing against the closet doors. The third bedroom/spare room in the basement has no windows or closets. There are also no linen closets anywhere on the main floor.

It took Northern Gate 10 months to replace a broken weather-strip on the bottom of the front door which all through this time had been allowing water, rain & snow to enter the house.

Even the simplest of tasks, for example replacing a bathroom light fixture took over 4 months. We eventually deducted the cost of replacing a kettle from the monthly maintenance fees which blew up due to a faulty receptacle which itself took over 3 months to have repaired. (See Photo Here) Notice scorch marks on cover and surrounding wall which they deny was ever a problem even though they were informed of the problem in writing on March 12, 2008, seen the kettle and when the cost of replacing the kettle was deducted in AUGUST 2008 they not only said nothing, they did nothing!

It gets better, when the hot water heater quit working, there were at least one and sometimes two appointments per day over a three day period made for the appropriate service people to come and repair the problem while we had to sit home and wait for them to show up. All of these appointments. No one showed up until the 4th day. We were never compensated for our wasted time or lack of hot water.

Pot holes are left unfilled for the most part for what is now approaching 15 months. Heavy equipment is used during the winter months which in some case has scratched some of the interlock as well as caused it to heave in places.

Maintenance fees, instead of heading down as we and others were advised have headed up. Part of this increase is allegedly due to increase in the cost of water testing even though the Town of Stouffville has stated that it through York Region supplies the water which is already been tested by them.

However, since Northern Gate have allegedly refused to open their books, (or provide confirmation of increased costs by way of actual invoices) who can really say why the cost of maintenance is going up. (see memo of 03.18.2009) NOTE: According to the letter threatening libel & slander this issue does not effect me and should be addressed withe landlord. I beg to differ as there is a contract/agreement with Northern Gate with my signature on it as well as Jim McCarthy’s)

The alarm provided by Northern Gate with emergency call was to be monitored by Counterforce in Mississauga, Ontario. However we contend that it was never monitored until over a year after we moved in which was in March, 2008. We were NEVER supplied with any written notice or certificate of monitoring until the date of the LTB hearing and the Certificate shown at that time was dated July 2008 – 5 months after moving in.

We have been in touch with Counterforce both via email and facsimile in an attempt to obtain a listing of all alarms during the time they claim it was monitored etc., but they, like Bart’s Appliances seem to have little or no interest in responding to us since March 26th, 2009.

In terms of landscaping, the only time weeds, which been allowed to grow over 3′ in height were cut down was when we did it. The flower beds or whatever have never been weeded by their grounds people, and when the grass is cut, rather than move around a flower pot the grounds people would rather cut it up with their tools. (perhaps I was more than a little frustrated when I wrote this and might have said 2′ to 3 ‘) (See Photo Example Here which also includes examples of lawn mowing and disposal of grass) Did Northern & McCarthy know about the weeds? Yes, not olny did they occupy the unit right beside me they were also informed in writing in the event they chose not see on AUGUST 1st, 2008)

Then when we decided to take some of our concerns to the Landlord & Tenant Board, the Realtor from whom we had made the original arrangement to lease with, signed on behalf of the landlord a letter stating that I had used abusive language when I had last talked to him. However, when he was confronted and asked to give one single example of anything that I might have said to him he could not remember so much as a single word.

Northern Gate refuses to reimburse for a furnace filter, alleging that that their people replaced it when in fact we have a form from their people stating it was not replaced!

Jim McCarthy, who seems to be the boss of bosses at Northern Gate – all I can say is beware of this character as he is willing to lie, misrepresent both verbally and in writing! (I have just recently obtained a copy of a letter he wrote on Northern Gate Letterhead and am satisfied that in this letter if he did not outright lie about me he most certainly made representations that are not in any way truthful or close to fair comment) (Given that Northern Gate and McCarthy have through their solicitor denied the issues of the electrical outlet, weeds and have charged in their maintenance fees for services that were paid for by me and never provided in some cases, I will leave it up to you to decide who is not telling the truth!

The best interests of Northern Gate seem to lie in waiting you out in hopes that you will go away and all will be forgotten. Even when they had information such as the questionable Alarm Monitoring Certificate or the information supplied by Bart’s Appliances they did not have the guts to even say a word to us as of the date of this post even though they knew these items were in question since moving in.

Discrimination – do not expect be treated equally here either. Some residents get things done like having their lawns fixed after they were messed up during the winter by the snow removal people but apparently other residents do not rate this consideration. The same applies to trimming of grass etc. during the summer of 2009.

Mr. Jim McCarthy is such a proud and considerate sort of person that he will not even consider meeting with the residents of Northern Gate en mass to discuss their concerns. So as one might gather, the folks at Northern Gate and some of their Vendors/Suppliers would rather run & hide or make up stories to achieve their own ends.

Never have I seen so many people so willing to lie, cheat and deprive residents of their rights in my life. So……………….Still thinking of retiring at Northern Gate?

Update 2009 – Northern Gate has apparently dismissed it landscapers in favour of having the property manager physically mow the lawn, which he leaves so short it almost looks bald. Occasionally he actually gets out the blower to remove clippings from the walkways and patios but cannot seem to get himself to avoid leaving mower marks all over some patios, never mind removal of same.

Although I am not certain how one qualifies for the service, but he will actually repair some lawns and walkways that were damaged through the winter by their front end loader but certainly not all. Perhaps it depend on whether they like you.

Another problem in this little community is there are a couple of residents who actually do most of their own landscaping and that of some of the other residents. I call them enablers because as long as they continue to do this Northern Gate gets away with doing virtually nothing while getting paid extremely well by way of maintenance fees which have jumped to some $400.00 per month as opposed to decreasing as originally promised.

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It is intended to blend the PST and the GST into one tax, in essence the theory is to cut down on paperwork and staff by merging two departments into one. This could of course be an attempt to cut costs but there is a problem and the problem is this: rather than just blend the two taxes into one on products and services that currently charge both taxes Pinocchio and his merry men have decided that this new tax will cover almost all goods and services including those where there is no PST at present.

You will become a victime of one of the biggest tax grabs in our history. How will this affect you? Let’s start with just a few things that are to be charged the extra 8%  and see if it will affect you or your family:-

Construction Materials Etc.
Gasoline
General Home Repairs
Government And City Services
Home Heating Fuel
Hydro
Professional Services
Used Cars
Water

And this is  just to name a few of the items you are going to be paying extra for and the $1000.00 bribe this clown is offering over two years is not going to come close to compensating you for this money grab. You will see an 8% increase in in the cost of almost everything except your paycheck and benefits. Pinocchio and his bandits are counting on you to do what you always do in these situations where he wants to pick your pockets, nothing!

You can help put an end to this insanity right now by sending your objection to this tax grab to Pinocchio and his band of highway robbers by simply clicking on the email addresses below and registering your objection. For once in your life stand up and make your voice heard loud and clear!

If these buffoons are conerned about getting re-elected they will listen! We’ve already done the hard part for you, all you have to do is click and send on the MPP email page we have set up for you. Take the time and send an email to those listed.

Click Here For The MPP Email Directory.

Donald Trump and Hilton Perez Gets Our Vote For “Assholes of The Decade”! Who in their right mind puts a complete asshole like Hilton Perez on a panel of judges for a beauty contest? The answer is simple, another Asshole! The Sponsors of Miss USA should be ashamed!!! And you wondered why there are more horse’s asses in the world than there are horses!

Carrie Prejean gets our vote for “Class Act of The Decade“

Editor’s Note: This comment from Pacy’s Moving & Storage deserves a place as a regular post as well as a comment, Pacy, I trust you don’t mind.

Extortion, Fraud, Thieves

On June 27, 2008 we moved our residence from (a temporary accommodation a Semi- Detached house) 3726 Bloomington Crescent, Mississauga, Ontario L5M 0A2 to 3153 Tacc Drive, Mississauga, ON L5M 0B6. (Detached home). For our move we engaged this moving company called “Desi Movers Inc. out of Scarborough, Ontario (No details of address, Phone # (416) 889 8107) a decision which will always remain as the most harrowing experience of our life.

On June 24th I spoke with Mr. Jay, as figured in the advertisement in Can India (who claimed himself to be the owner of the company) and again we reconfirmed our booking and rates that were offered to us ($ 65 per hour for a 28 foot truck with 3 men) with them on the 26th June and again on June 27th at 9 Am to ensure the movers show up at our house at the scheduled time of 10 AM.

As promised they showed up around 10.15 Am with three men and can’t confirm if the truck was exact 28 feet (guess it must have been close to that). As soon they reached our residence first thing they did was to pick up a quarrel with my next door neighbor by driving the truck in their yard and messing the grass.

The moving started with loading our main expensive leather couches and immediately after loading the couches the driver of the truck (Mr. Moses) presented a contract to my wife stating that they need to have the document signed before they can do any further loading and asked her to initial the so called contract. Seizing the opportunity of seeing no males at home decided to pressurize two ladies who were at home (my wife and my mother-in-law) the driver demanded $ 200 be given to him as advance before loading our belongings. Hoping that they will not waste time in loading my wife paid them $ 200 as demanded. After another 15 minutes or so the driver again demanded another $ 300 be paid. By the time I reached home and he said that he has received instructions from his owner Mr. Jay that he must collect additional $ 300 before they can load further which we again paid them. It wouldn’t stop at that even before one fourth our belongings were loaded they demanded more payments an additional amount of $ 400 and they all stopped working, and we ended up paying a total of $ 900 before most of the things got loaded.

The drive to our new home was about 3 Km and when they reached our door step they wouldn’t start unloading the goods. After about 20 minutes, the driver (Moses) came in with an invoice showing a total of $ 4203.50. We argued for about 45 minutes and my wife in meantime also called the police and they said they would not interfere in this matter as this is a civil case. In meantime they started threatening us stating they will have to take the belongings to a bonded warehouse and it could take over $ 5000 to clear goods from the bonded warehouse, etc. The demand was they receive complete payment of $ 4203.50 be received immediately wanted the payment can be received only by cash and not by Credit card or any other mode. This created additional problem as we did not have so much cash on us and had to rush my wife to banks to withdraw funds from different banks as our limits for daily withdrawal of cash would permit withdrawal of such huge sum of money.

In meantime they drove away the truck away from the house to end of the street (about 300 meters away which created additional tension as the truck was no longer in our sight. The hustling for payment continued at this point two other helpers to the driver also joined the party saying they have to go and they won’t be able to unload unless we make the payments immediately. Pressuring from all corners this in addition to managing our elderly parents who were in deep shock at the behavior of the movers, and my wife going thru the stress of also managing our young son. She decided to drop our son at one of our friends place so that he is away from this utmost traumatizing situation. In addition to all these we had the deadline of handing over our temporary accommodation back to the builders before end of the day. It was almost 3 PM when the unloading had still not started and we had still quite a lot of things at our house, which were to be cleaned up before 6 PM. On one hand we had to deal with these thugs and on the other hand we had to complete the move before end of the day and to top it all, no support coming from the law enforcement agency created additional trauma.

Looking at all these we had no option but to pay off the movers the ransom payment (I would like to describe only that way). All that we managed was reduce the ransom payment from $ 4203.50 to $ 3800. We paid $ 3800 with a hope at least the job will be done.

Though everything that was loaded in the truck was unloaded but barring couple items most of our things were dropped at the foray itself. Even little things they moved they handled it so carelessly and resulting in minor damages to the furniture and scratches and dents to the flooring and walls.

The contract that my wife had initialed was never handed over to us and the driver got into the truck promising he would give us copy and suddenly sped away so rapidly. We are yet to get over the shock of dealing with these thugs and sadly the whole experience of enjoying our new home has been overwhelmed by this shocking experience. – Venkat Ramaseshan

Can you believe the incredible nerve of the idiots who run this company that they could actually stoop to such a low level? Apparently, Elsa has filed n application with Human Rights Tribunal. I hope she wins big time. As for Weston Property Management, if ever a company deserved to be blacklisted, they do. Spread the word!