movers wont move piano

So, last week I posted a message to the list asking what equipment was necessary to move a piano. I was planning to move it myself. As it turns out I was not in town when the piano needed to be moved, so I had to hire movers.

I have an upright player piano that is apparently very heavy. My friend (who is housing my piano and is moving to a new apartment) said that the movers had the piano out of control on the short stairway out of her apartment (they had it on a dolly and a ramp down the stairs). Then, when they got to the new apartment, they said they didn't want to move it up her stairs.

There are several other pianos in the apartments near my friend's, so I know it is possible to move a piano up the stairs. The movers said they would have to tip the piano to get around the corners in the stairs, and they didn't want to. The piano was heavy, and they didn't want to tip it because it was a player. Grrr!

Now I had to pay $150 just to do a simple moving job that I could have done myself. It was supposed to cost $240 to move it up the stairs. I know the piano is heavy and that it is difficult to get it up the stairs. That's one reason why I decided to hire movers.

They put the piano in the garage, and now I have to hire another company to move the piano up the stairs, and they probably have a some minimum rate plus a fee for stairs (I just had to pay the minimum rate for the other movers). Seems like I am paying twice.

Is there some reason why a player can't be tipped? I know it is heavy. I could take out the player mechanism, if that is a big deal.

I don't think I'll every hire piano movers again unless I have to. This company said that they specialized in moving pianos in their yellow pages ad, although they were a general moving company and moved other things as well.

Sounds to me like you did not hire piano movers. TS

I had my player piano moved to a second floor apartment a few years ago. The stairwell had a 90 degree turn with a railing that I was worried about, so I make a little scaled down paper model to see if it would make it. Since the paper model was only 2 inches long, it had no problem making it up the 3 foot wide staircase, but I was still worried. When the movers did the actual job, there were 3 big guys, and they managed to heft it up there and actually had to angle it up and over the railing slightly (so much for the paper model).

Get some movers who specialize in piano moving, tell them to bring at least 3 guys because it's a player, and you should be all set.

<< I don't think I'll every hire piano movers again unless I have to. >>

You didn't in the first place. You hired household movers, unfortunately. Was there a reason you didn't call a local piano dealer or two for some recommendations?

<< This company said that they specialized in moving pianos in their yellow pages ad, although they were a general moving company and moved other things as well. >>

And thus we have one of life's great truisms: 'Paper Seldom Refuses Ink'.