AFRA - The Australian Furniture Removers Association

1800 671 806 or www.afra.com.au

Did you realise the training one must undertake, the red tape one must endure and the hoops one must jump through to start up a business?

It’s a crazy world we live in when you need up to 6 licences to open a Beauty Salon, up to 10 licences to open a Cafe, as many as 21 licences to be a Tour Operator. Even a small Handyman service requires up to 4 licences, but to call yourself a Furniture Removalist, which generally entails the responsible art of pre-packing, removing, transporting and then replacing a family's worldly possessions into their new address, often travelling over long distances, there is NO MANDATORY training required.

No licence required! No red tape! No Hoops!

In fact the Australian furniture removal industry has no Mandatory Government Regulations to protect the consumer against dodgy operators (of which there are many). If you do get burned by one of these cowboys, your only recourse is to sue them in court or to take them to a Department Of Fair Trading Tribunal, both of which can be very painful experiences that you would probaly not want to go through twice.

However there is a Government Industry Body which was appointed back in 1993. It's called AFRA (The Australian Furniture Removers Association). Two of the primary reasons it was created was for protection for the consumer and compliance to a set of standards by its members.

Does every removalist belong to AFRA?

The answer is NO.

In fact, for every three removalists who apply for AFRA Accreditation there would be two turned away because they don't meet the required standards, or don't have the desire to comply.

If you moved with a NON-AFRA REMOVALIST COMPANY (we'll call them a NARC), and you wanted to make a legitimate claim against them, you would have the following avenues for compensation.

1.  Sue them in court.

Of course lawyers are expensive, and court cases have a habit of getting adjourned, often taking months of protracted legal battles, sometimes with no positive result for the claimant.

2.  Take them to a Dept of Fair Trading Tribunal

This can be more of a drama than you bargained for.

The following story shows the frustration you may experience if you ever seek compensation.

You would first need to go to DFT and lodge your complaint. Fill out a statement and wait.
DFT will notify you of your hearing date.
You turn up to the hearing and it gets adjourned because the NARC lodged a late "excuse not to show" and it was accepted by the DFT adjudicator. This excuse will often be deployed by the defendant to upset you, to wear you down, so maybe you won't show up next time.
You turn up to the next hearing to find that the NARC'S statement basically discredits you and he has lied about some of the facts. This will become most infuriating to you and it is totally unfair. However it is your lucky day. The adjudicator sees through this ploy and awards your claim, to be paid to you by a certain date.
The due date arrives and you haven't been paid. You call DFT who say you will now need to go down to the courthouse to lodge a Statement of Liquidated Claim (SLC).
You duly go down to the courthouse, pay your fee, and lodge your SLC which will be sent to the NARC with a due date of payment.
That date arrives and you still have not received your claim from the NARC. You contact the DFT and they inform you that you will now need to take out a Writ of Execution (WOE).
You will then need to again go back to the courthouse, pay your fee, lodge your WOE and wait.
Five weeks pass and you find that the Sheriff is to serve the NARC with an order to pay or his belongings will be seized. When the sheriff turns up the NARC tells the sheriff that everything on-site belongs to another entity, so the sheriff walks away empty handed.
Now the only legal way to win is to start the process off again which, as you can see, is a total waste of time and money because the NARC knows the ropes.
It may give you comfort to know that you will never have to go through this scenario if you move with an Accredited AFRA member such as Acrobat Removals.
You can have peace of mind knowing that upon AFRA accepting that company as a member, they must forfeit a large cash security bond to AFRA. If the customer of an AFRA member was to make a legitimate claim against that company to AFRA, that customer would receive that amount from the bond.
That is fantastic protection for you, the consumer, and a huge incentive for the removalist to do the right thing.

If you use a non-AFRA removalist your only recourse will be the legal system where you could find yourself the main character in our story.