Wanted to provide an update and our experience. First the van is safely back in Colorado which provides a little peace of mind.
We started off listing the Van on Uship to get quotes and bids to ship it from Vegas to Denver. We quickly found that all of the bidders were brokers - no carriers or shippers were bidding on the van. We decided to book with a broker that had some good reviews. They were not hte cheapest. They were somewhat responsive to emails but would never return phone calls. After about 9 days, however, it was clear they could not perform and could not find a carrier, so we cancelled.
During that time I had also submitted a request for quote on some auto transport brokers. One was Road Runner Auto Transport. The person I dealt with their educated me about the industry and urged me to not go with Uship, etc. He explained that no carrier would actually haul the van given its size based on the prices quoted. He ended up being correct. His quote was a little higher but explained it was due to the size of the van. Totally made sense. As soon as I booked with them, they had a carrier lined up for a pickup 2 days later and a delivery date that met my expectations. The one mistake they made is they inadvertently listed it as a regular Econoline even though I sent dimensions and pictures. So the carrier that showed up could not haul. I contacted Road Runner and they started searching for a new carrier and immediately found one. That carrier picked it up an hour later and delivered it a day early (yesterday). Road Runner seemed very committed to the customer. You do wait on hold a long time, but they will call you back and are really good at responding to emails. I would use them again. I will never list with Uship.
We were able to go look at the van last night (we had it dropped off at the Ford dealership). The van looked as we had left it - really good shape other than the V10. Anyway, I will not use Uship in the future (but I hope I never have to ship my SMB again).
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