Talk:U-Haul

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[edit] Factual Errors

  • What factual errors????? Please specify - thanks, if not I will erase the tag. Themepark

[edit] How much should I include on the page?

TM-10' DC-14' EL-17' GH-24' JH-26'

LV-4x6 (rare) UV-4x8 AV-5x8 RT-Ramptrailer 5x9 (rare) MV-5x10 RV-6x12

if a trailer has an "O" as part of the last letter then it is open (no top). ie.: LO-4x6 open

TB-Towbar (rare) TD-Tow Dolly AT-Autotransport

all equipment numbers should have four numbers and a single letter after them ie.: DC 2546 J

if they have four numbers before and after without a letter they are an older model. They were manufactured before we had suffixes (the single letter) and we call the four numbers preceding the identity code the "Fleet Number" ie.: 1234 LV 4567 1234 would be the Fleet Number

The nation is broken down into Districts. Each district is broken down into MCO's or Marketing Companies. Each Marketing Company has a MCP (Marketing Company President), an EA (Executive Assistant) and a TCM (Traffic Control Manager). Under the TCM you will find RMs (Reservation Managers). When you call the regional office you will most likely be speaking to a RM. The highest you will get if you ask for the "boss" is the TCM.

Each MCO is in charge of a number of centers and dealerships. The centers are taken care of by GMs (General Managers) and the dealerships are taken care of by AFMs (Area Field Managers). Under the GM you have CSRs (Customer Service Representatives). The center is operated by the GM who is under direct authority of the MCP. The centers get paid by the U-Haul company. The manager gets a salary. Each dealership is a privately owned business working with U-Haul. The business operates its own hours and does not own any of the equipment U-Haul assigns to it. The dealership makes a small commission on every rental and actually pays U-Haul for the right to rent the equipment.

  • Dealers do not pay U-Haul for the right to rent equipment. The only fee a dealer must pay is a $10.00 per month computer service fee. Also U-Haul pays an average of 22% commission across all product lines.

[edit] Cleanup

The last section "Safety Issues" needs to be cleaned up badly. I'd do it if not for the fact that I'm in finals right now and don't have time (or the knowledge about U-Haul) to do it properly. The Chief 16:41, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Fixed the 1st paragraph. Seems one-sided though with only listings of negative reports. Perhaps someone has a more objective take on it. --Whatthree16 00:01, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

I worked at an MCO for two years in the past and we heard this stuff (safety issues) all the time. It's mainly due to the fact that U-Haul has a bigger rental product than anyone else. U-Haul has repair shops working non-stop to keep equipment up to par. You don't want everyone and their brother writing about "incidents" they've heard off the news or in the paper. The article would go on forever. It should be limited to major investigations.

I believe I have balanced the final paragraph. Someone else must obviously be the judge of the work. TuckerIsGod 2/13/06

The last paragraph under Rental Rates is incorrect and sounds like its coming from a disgruntled and biased source. When you make a reservation at U-Haul, you select a *preferred* location and *preferred* pickup time for your rental truck. Traffic downloads the reservation to the nearest center that has the equipment available. The center then calls the day before the rental to confirm pickup time and location with the customer. When a time and location is agreed upon, the truck will be there UNLESS there are unforseen circumstances such as:

  • Other customers not returning on time.
  • Broken down equipment due to customer neglegence.

If you made a reservation, why wouldn't U-Haul want to fulfill it? Less rentals means less money. --Tiresia 21:01, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

U-haul *does* have a reputation for not fulfilling reservations, after taking an online reservation and charging a $5 reservation fee. This practice can be especially annoying to movers who are depending upon a truck and are told that they cannot have one due to someone else's fault, no matter how far in advance the reservation was made. Perhaps a section should be added for criticisms of U-Haul's reservation policy.- Pickle1999

Yeah I put that in there because I had "reserved" a truck with them only to find out the day before my move that a "confirmed reservation" does not mean anything with U-Haul. I've reworded the paragraph to sound less vindictive (hey, I was pissed at the time) but I still think it's worth having as a warning to people who may be forced out of an apartment regardless of if they have a truck or not. --66.222.240.194 20:00, 2 July 2006 (UTC)jay

Yes, the "confirmed reservation" does cause a problem to the customers. I rented the U-Haul to only found out that they canceled our reservation the morning we wanted to move-out, and ended up with a higher price truck. I really don't see the point of reservation made there! Not to mention the extremely low quality service/facilities which I won't point it out here. The customers deserve to know this - bistari July 25, 2006

I changed some of the language in the history section because much of it is somewhat questionable or based upon conjecture. This article as a whole is still very biased and appears to be largely modified by disgruntled uhaul customers. Also the book Birthright is not even quoted as a source but I can promise you that's where a good chunk of the history section comes from.- oliverma July 19, 2007

I ended up deleting most of the Criticism section, because it came off as the author's criticism of UHaul, not an encyclopedic criticism. However, in trying to deliver a response, I think i have only replaced it with Original Research. I don't think it's any better encyclopedically, just more fair. TuckerIsGod 8/23/2007 —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 68.185.195.55 (talk) 07:06, August 23, 2007 (UTC)

There is a place for comments like "Mr PR Guy", and it is here. I'm not employed in the public relations department. I'm a grunt UHaul employee. I work at the counter, take reservations, and fix trucks. If you wish to discuss the reasons we do not have programs for specific drop off locations, please do it here. I am reverting the changes made to my paragraphs because they are not the least bit encyclopedic. However, if you find that my discourse on the policies of UHaul is also non-encyclopedic, then i challenge the need for a Criticism section. TuckerIsGod 8/24/2007 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.96.67.143 (talk) 23:28, August 24, 2007 (UTC)

The current Criticisms section is severely non-encyclopedic and not NPOV. I suggest we remove it entirely until we can replace it with less original research.Mathfreq 21:08, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't disagree. TuckerIsGod 9/20/2007 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.136.76.186 (talk) 05:04, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] "Safety Issues"

With respect to the explanation that safety conditions in Canada are worse because of harsh climate, I think this counts as "original research" as it's not found elsewhere. I've added citations and cleaned up the first Safety Issues paragraph, and tried to balance it by adding a paragraph of U-Haul's replies.

--- "safety conditions are worse because of "HARSH CLIMATE" " - that makes no sense - clearly if other vehicles are able to run safely in Canada - climate is of no issue. I'm sure driving a truck in hot climates has an equal number of issues. This is a biased comment.

Because no one else has been active here for a while, I removed the neutrality and clean-up tags, but if someone thinks it's still not balanced, chuck away.

Great that you added U-Haul's responses for balance. On the other hand, surely this line is biased in U-Haul's favour:

Various news agencies have reported possible safety problems,

The safety problems are real and serious, not "possible".

While that may be original research, any UHaul employee who has worked for a few years outside can tell you when a truck has spent a significant amount of time in Canada. These trucks suffer from the heavy use of salt to melt roads. The salt causes excessive rusting on the frame, underside of the carriage, and in some cases, the motor and transmission. Canadian trucks are somewhat unique in that they should not be rented into the US, while US trucks are free to be rented into and around Canada. Even though a US truck may spend some time in Canada, it is still more likely to spend a large portion of it's rental history in the US. Our trucks are designed around an internal combustion engine, where there are thousands of small explosions per second that reach temperatures far above what might be experienced outside of the vehicle. Heat is not an issue for UHaul trucks. In the end, you're right. That section I wrote had no business on Wikipedia. TuckerIsGod 8/24/2007 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.96.67.143 (talk) 23:47, August 24, 2007 (UTC)

The last paragraph of this section is a mess. For example the first sentence, "To U-Haul's credit, however, since there are over 15,000 dealers, their polices are difficult to enforce." How is a difficulty enforcing policy credit U-Haul in some way? Perhaps "One of the challenges U-Haul faces is that with over 15,000 dealers their policies are difficult to enforce" would be better. This sentence begins by defending U-Haul as if it were in an argument rather than an encyclopedia. I think a reference for this "common knowledge" is required; as well it's obvious an unrentable truck does not turn a profit and I would argue that the adjective "minor" when describing safety issues is subjective at best and contradictory at worst - when is safety minor? Why does the last sentence summarize the rest of the paragraph? This paragraph makes good points but looks like a high school essay trying to defend U-Haul rather than an encyclopedia trying to inform objectively.CoW mAnX (talk) 20:37, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Reservations

The class action (Rosenberg v. U-Haul, Case # 144045) was filed in July 2002 in Santa Cruz Superior Court. A three week trial ended in April 2006. Judge Stevens held that U-Haul's conduct violates the California Consumer Legal Remedies Act, the Unfair Competition and the False Advertising laws. The injunction applies to transactions in California except for dealer originated in town (round trip) transactions and orders U-Haul to stop using the term "Confirmed Reservation."

Primary source: http://64.166.146.51/openaccess/CIVIL/civildetails.asp?casenumber=CV144045&courtcode=A&dsn=&casetype=CIS

[edit] Neutral point of view.

www.uhaulisbad.com, www.dontuseuhaul.com, www.uhaul-sucks.com do not have a neutral point of view. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 209.83.57.36 (talk) 04:08, August 23, 2007 (UTC)

[edit] UHaul equipment license plates in Hawaii

I have recently moved to Hawaii and notice that UHaul trucks here (while sparse) are not plated in Arizona. Hawaii doesn't deal with auto registration like the mainland. You wouldn't have an apportioned vehicle (like all mainland UHaul vehicles) registered in Arizona operating in Hawaii simply because to get a vehicle here, you have to ship it. All UHaul equipment in Hawaii appears to be plated in Hawaii. I have seen the newest livery on UHaul equipment here leading me to believe that it is all corporate owned rental equipment and not people that have purchased used equipment and are operating locally.

UHaul may operate a subsidiary for the Hawaii market.

I am working on getting details, but this might also be worth checking for Alaska. They may operate differently than the 48 connected states and Canada.

  • Hawaii is in an independent marketing company. All the equipment is built there and stays there. Naturally, no one will be getting a one-way rental from Maui to Cleveland.SammyU (talk) 02:29, 19 December 2007 (UTC)
    • I spoke to U-Haul's director of PR on the phone today after an email exchange. Her name is Joanne Fried (email address withheld, but contact me privately if you want to talk to her). Here is the information she gave me:
  1. All equipment bearing a U-Haul logo (trucks or trailers) are owned by U-Haul.
  2. All equipment operating in the connected 48 states bear Arizona apportioned plates. She said prior to U-Haul doing apportioned vehicle registration, equipment was registered in the state the equipment generally operated in (or the U-Haul center it was initially assigned to).
  3. Trailers are handled in a different way. The life of a trailer tends to be longer in the U-Haul system, so you are likely to see trailers still bearing non-Arizona plates. All new U-Haul trailers are registered in Arizona, but the older ones still operating in the system will have non-Arizona plates.
  4. U-Haul operates in both Hawaii and Alaska, but all equipment operating there is for in-town use only and is registered in that state. The reason for this is that neither Hawaii nor Alaska have apportioned vehicle registration systems. But, she did say that nothing is different about the Hawaii or Alaska markets, as in there is not a separate subsidiary that handles business in those states.

Dlcantrell (talk) 08:57, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

For the record, U-Haul pickup trucks and cargo vans (Ford F-150 and E-150) are leased to the company for a fee. U-Haul International does not own these vechiles.SammyU (talk) 01:31, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

  • Because that's really what my point was about. I was contacting U-Haul to ask about vehicle registration, not whether or not they lease or own vehicles. They cleared the registration issue up for me. The representative I talked to at the corporate office said all equipment they operate is owned by U-Haul, she never mentioned leases. I can't imagine leasing being a viable option for U-Haul anyway as their entire business resolves around putting lots of wear, tear, and mileage on equipment. To me, it would make sense for them to own all equipment outright, which is what I was told on the phone. Still, my original point was about the vehicle registration plates, and that's really all I wanted to bring up. The article here is incorrect. I've provided this information here regarding the Alaska and Hawaii markets and I would like to update the article to indicate that. Thanks. --Dlcantrell (talk) 01:45, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

—Preceding unsigned comment added by Dlcantrell (talk • contribs) 21:09, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] OBJECTIVE?

"Replying to the Toronto Star, the company's Canadian officials cited its inspection policies and procedures that employees and dealers are expected to follow,

and spoke of the fact that most of the equipment is shoddy, faulty, likely to explode in certain cases.---- citation?

In response to the CTV results, Canadian U-Haul vice-president admitted to not heeding earlier warnings to improve their vehicles' safety conditions, and said older trucks would be replaced even though the ones replacing them would be just about as bad, because they are basically the most greedy company since Satan."

If the above statements are to remain, shouldn't there be a citation? Which VP said "...the most greedy company since Satan"? Websterwebfoot (talk) 03:47, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

Vandalism removed from article Pendragon39 (talk) 11:50, 17 April 2008 (UTC)