Short Summary
Sherpa Auto Transport is our top pick for good reasons. First, they have amazing reviews from tons of happy customers on Google. They also have very few complaints filed against them with the Better Business Bureau. Comparing pricing, we didn’t just look at base prices. We checked BBB complaints, especially about bait-and-switch pricing or people paying but never getting their service. Sherpa had basically zero complaints like these. Because of their stellar reviews, great complaint record, and competitive pricing, Sherpa earned our #1 spot. But we’ll dive deeper into all the details below.
How It Works
In the beginning, it’s important to understand how car shipping works. None of these companies actually transport your vehicle themselves. The vast majority are brokers. What does that mean? Brokers keep an eye on the market and available carriers. When you book with them, they find a suitable carrier company to handle the actual transport and pass along your job, keeping the difference in price. Is going directly to a carrier better? Not really. Most carriers move multiple vehicles at once. Brokers consolidate shipments by location to get special rates because of the high volumes they book. They also vet carriers, validate insurance, and provide the largest selection of options. However, this doesn’t absolve brokers of responsibility. They are still accountable for picking and vetting the carriers they use. They handle customer service and communications. When you book, you’re doing business with the broker – they are the ones you researched and will hold responsible.
Customer Satisfaction
First, let’s look at the easiest metric of customer satisfaction to track: Google reviews. We’ve compiled the statistics for each company on this page, so you don’t have to search individually. Is this metric alone good enough to make a decision? Absolutely not. All of these companies have Google reviews scores above 4.5/5 with many reviews, which may seem reflective of their services. However, our analysis of Better Business Bureau complaints revealed that Google reviews alone may not tell the full story (more on that later in our comparison). Nevertheless, Google reviews are an important metric that cannot be ignored.
| Sherpa Auto Transport | 4.8 | 1,718 |
| Montway Auto Transport | 4.7 | 15,232 |
| AmeriFreight Car Transport | 4.7 | 3,471 |
| Easy Auto Ship | 4.6 | 3,890 |
| American Auto Shipping | 4.6 | 896 |
Pricing
Requesting quotes to transport a large SUV around 1,200 miles, we found covered trailer pricing fell within a similar range of $1,490 to $1,710 across companies. For transporting a valuable vehicle worth the cost of covered shipping, a $200 difference isn’t hugely significant. This is where customer satisfaction and complaints become crucial factors, which we’ll dive into below. For the more popular uncovered option, prices varied more widely – three companies quoted $1,050 to $1,241, while two others came in lower at $849 and $909. However, inspecting Better Business Bureau complaints revealed most companies had reports that needed consideration when evaluating quotes. The most common issue was underquoting, where the final bill far exceeded the initial quote. Another was accepting a deposit but never providing service – essentially baiting customers with a low price into poor service. We viewed these as pricing issues, factoring complaint ratios into our pricing score formula. We exported and analyzed all BBB complaints, calculating each complaint type’s ratio to the total. Incorporating these ratios, here is our pricing score ranking with a brief summary per business.
- Sherpa Auto Transport (Pricing Score: 8)Sherpa Auto Transport showed competitive pricing ($1,050 for uncovered trailer) and 0 pricing or payments related complaints. They’re not that much more expensive than the cheapest quotes. And lack of not only pricing or payments related Better Business Bureau complaints, but almost any complaints all together, puts them on top of our list.
- American Auto Shipping (Pricing Score: 6.3)American Auto Shipping has provided the 2nd lowest quote ($909 for uncovered trailer). But there’s an issue of the kind of complaints with the Better Business Bureau. A whopping 75% of issues found on their BBB page are related to people making some kind of payment (deposits and such) and never receiving a service.
- Montway Auto Transport (Pricing Score: 5.8)Online payment quote came in 2nd most expensive ($1,149). They also have a significant amount of Better Business Bureau complaints pertaining to receiving some kind of payment and not delivering a service. Although, at 13.3% of their complaints related to this issue, they’re far from the worst offenders on our list.
- AmeriFreight Car Transport (Pricing Score: 4) AmeriFreight Car Transport offered the lowest quote for uncovered trailer transport ($849). But their Better Business Bureau page has the highest ratio of complaints for bait-and-switch pricing. Also, a whopping 60% of their complaints are related to people making some kind of payments and not receiving a service. So, this quote should probably be taken with a grain of salt.
- Easy Auto Ship (Pricing Score: 3.8) Easy Auto Ship not only provided the most expensive quote for uncovered trailer ($1,241), but they also have the 2nd highest ratio of underquoting Better Business Bureau complaints on our list.
Better Business Bureau Complaints.
Another factor we examined was the number of complaints filed with the Better Business Bureau. The BBB tracks complaints over the last 3 years and the last 12 months. We focused on the 12-month metric, as we believe companies should have a chance to improve based on feedback. A well-run organization should be able to adjust and reduce complaint volumes over time. If a business takes complaints seriously, their 12-month rate should decrease compared to the 3-year total. Conversely, if they don’t address issues, the complaint stream remains constant. To account for this, we divided each company’s 12-month complaints by their total complaints, using that percentage in our grading formula. Here’s a summary of how the companies performed on this metric:
| Company | Complaints | Percentage |
|---|---|---|
| Sherpa Auto Transport | 1 | 0.21% |
| Easy Auto Ship | 12 | 1.71% |
| AmeriFreight Car Transport | 12 | 2.39% |
| American Auto Shipping | 12 | 3.18% |
| Montway Auto Transport | 75 | 3.31% |
Conclusion: why Sherpa Auto Transport is the top pick
Taking into consideration all the criteria listed above, we conclude that Sherpa Auto Transport is the best choice. Not only do they have the least chance of unwanted situations arising, but they are most likely to provide an excellent overall service. All the companies on our list have Google review scores above 4.5 (Sherpa has the highest at 4.8), which suggests stellar performance. However, looking at Better Business Bureau complaints tells a different story that calls some of those review histories into question. Sherpa Auto Transport having only 1 complaint in the last 12 months (at the time of writing), while maintaining a comparable number of BBB reviews, is very impressive. We also evaluated instant quotes against histories of bait-and-switch pricing or accepting payment without rendering service. Sherpa provided competitive pricing with no complaints related to pricing issues. When considering which company we would trust to move our own vehicle, Sherpa Auto Transport clearly stands out as the top choice.