White Plains mover disputes missing $750,000 shipment

Luticia Floyd claims that most of her possessions shipped to Florida last year never arrived, in a $750,000 lawsuit against Al & Son Moving & Storage Inc., and items that did arrive were damaged.

But the White Plains moving company “disputes that the move ever occurred,” in a court filing, and says Floyd sued the wrong company.

Al’s has been in the moving business since 1948 and is operated now by Albert and Sandra Fanelli and their two sons. It boasts on its website that the third-generation family business is the most reliable local moving company.

Floyd says she hired Al’s last December to take furniture, appliances, personal documents and memorabilia from Westchester to Pompano Beach, Florida.

Three trucks were loaded with her household goods but only one truck arrived in Florida. That truck was late, according to the complaint filed last month in Westchester Supreme Court, and some of the property was broken or damaged by water and mold.

Floyd claims that Al’s subcontracted the move to another company, whose name she doesn’t know, without her permission.

She was not given a bill of lading as proof of delivery, a receipt or an inventory, White Plains attorney Carl L. Finger argues in the complaint, in violation of federal law.

Floyd also accuses the mover of breach of contract, fraud and negligence under state laws.

But there is no evidence that Floyd hired Al’s, the mover’s Manhattan attorney Jennifer R. Oxman says in a Dec. 10 letter to U.S. Magistrate Judge Judith C. McCarthy.

Oxman moved the lawsuit to U.S. District Court in White Plains on Dec. 7, arguing that disputes involving interstate shipping are covered by federal law.

Al’s does use third-party contractors to haul goods, the letter states, but it was unable to locate any documents of any move by Floyd.

Alleged damages must be limited to actual losses, Oxman argues, under federal law. Floyd is demanding $750,000 for “valuable and irreplaceable items which were damaged beyond repair or were forever lost,” but her complaint does not itemize or detail the losses.

Oxman is asking federal court to dismiss the lawsuit.

The Better Business Bureau gives Al’s Moving and Storage ”” including Al & Son Moving & Storage and the Veral Corp. ”” an A+ rating. But four customer reviews in the past three years gave the mover an average of one star out of a possible five.

The National Consumer Complaint Database lists three complaints in two years against Al’s Moving Co., the federally licensed company at the same White Plains address.