Questions
Straight answers, including the unhelpful ones
Twenty-five questions, grouped. Several of the answers are no — we do not move pianos, we do not dispose of anything, and we do not own the crossing our crew books. Those are the answers worth reading first.
Counting the crew
Counting the crew
- 1What is actually in a crew?
- People and a vehicle. On a two-person job both of them carry; on a three-person job one of them is frequently doing something else entirely — holding a lift, staging a lobby, staying with the van on a red route. That third person is why the other two can keep moving.
- 2How do you work out the number before seeing the place?
- Four answers do most of it: what floor each address is on, whether there is a lift and whether it is shared, where a vehicle can legally stand at each end, and the widest single item you own. Photographs of the staircase turn and the frontage settle almost everything else.
- 3Can the crew size change on the day?
- It should not, and when it does it is nearly always because an access fact turned out differently — a lift out of service, a bay not suspended after all, a stair narrower than described. We would rather find that in advance, which is why we ask about it so insistently.
- 4Is a bigger crew faster, or just more people?
- On a long carry it is genuinely faster, because carrying is the whole job and more carriers means more trips in parallel. On a short door-to-door job with a lift, a third person adds much less, and we will tell you that rather than sell you one.
- 5Do you ever refuse to send fewer people?
- Yes. If a job involves a large sofa on a turning staircase or a fridge-freezer that has to go down a flight, we will not send one person to it. That is a safety answer rather than a commercial one.
Access, buildings and parking
Access, buildings and parking
- 1What is the single most useful measurement I can send?
- The clear diagonal at the tightest turn of your staircase. It decides more London moves than volume does, and almost nobody has taken it. Send that plus the longest rigid dimension of your largest item and most will-it-fit questions answer themselves.
- 2Who arranges parking?
- We tell you what we need and where; the permit or bay suspension is applied for through the borough, and boroughs differ enormously in how much notice they want. Start it well ahead of the move rather than the week before.
- 3What if there is nowhere legal to stop at all?
- Then the nearest legal standing point becomes part of the job and we measure the walk from it. A long trolleyed carry is normal work in central London; it just has to be known about when the crew is being decided rather than discovered on the morning.
- 4My block has a goods lift with a booking system.
- Then the booking is the day. We need the window, the lift dimensions and whether floor protection is required, and we will stage everything beside the lift before it opens rather than fetching during it.
- 5Do you need the lift to be reserved for us?
- Where the building allows it, it helps enormously. Where it does not — most residential blocks with one passenger lift — we plan for sharing it, which is exactly the situation that adds a person.
On the day
On the day
- 1What should be done before the crew arrives?
- Washing machines and dishwashers disconnected and drained, beds stripped, drawers emptied of anything loose, and a clear route from the door to the street. None of it is glamorous and all of it saves crew time.
- 2Will you dismantle furniture?
- Yes, where something will not pass a doorway whole, and we rebuild it at the far end. Flat-pack wardrobes that have already been moved once are the usual casualty, and we will say when we think something will not survive another trip.
- 3Do you provide materials?
- Blankets, straps, trolleys and covers come with the crew. Boxes and packing materials are arranged separately, and if you want them packed by us that is the packers rather than the moving crew.
- 4What about things you will not take?
- Pianos, anything requiring a waste carrier licence, and anything a carrier or ferry operator prohibits on a cross-border load. We hold no waste carrier licence, so an old item leaving has to be going to a person or an address rather than to disposal.
- 5How do you handle a same-day completion?
- With a full crew and the load staying on the vehicle between the two addresses. The keys are not in our control and nor is the chain, so the plan has to survive one of them being late — which usually means loading everything before anything is expected to happen.
Leaving the country
Leaving the country
- 1Does your crew travel with the load?
- Yes. All four destinations are road routes, so the crew that packs and loads your flat in London is the crew that unloads it at the far end. What we do not own is the crossing — a booked slot on a tunnel or ferry operator — and we are straightforward about that rather than implying we control the timetable.
- 2What does packing to export standard change?
- Everything is wrapped for vibration, movement and stacking over a long run rather than for a twenty-minute drive, and the inventory has to match the paperwork item for item. It is slower work, done by packers, and it is not the same as packing for a move across London.
- 3Sole-use or shared load?
- Sole-use means the vehicle carries your goods only, so they are loaded once and unloaded once. Shared means the load is consolidated with other households going the same way, which costs less and involves more handling at both ends. We describe the trade-off rather than pushing one.
- 4Who deals with customs?
- A customs agent files the entry; you supply the documents and the declarations, and the accuracy of both is legally yours. We will tell you what is normally asked for on a route, and none of it is legal, tax or immigration advice.
- 5Which countries do you have dedicated pages for?
- France, Spain, Italy and Portugal — the four routes we run, each with a page of its own. Those four are the whole list, and the overseas page sets out how each one runs.
Quotes and working with us
Quotes and working with us
- 1How do I get a price?
- Send both addresses, the floors, the access at each end and a rough list of the furniture. You will get a written quote back once we have looked at it properly — we would rather take a little longer and be right than answer instantly and revise it later.
- 2Do you quote without seeing the property?
- For flats and single rooms, usually yes, on photographs and measurements. For houses, offices and anything with an unusual access problem, a survey is better for both of us and we will ask for one.
- 3Is the quote fixed?
- It is fixed against the facts you gave us. If the access turns out to be materially different from what was described, the crew or the plan may have to change, and we will say so at the time rather than afterwards.
- 4Are you insured?
- We carry goods-in-transit and public liability cover. The terms, limits and what is excluded are set out in the booking contract, and high-value or fragile items should be declared before the day rather than mentioned on it.
- 5What if I need to change the date?
- Tell us as early as you can and we will move it where there is capacity. The cancellation and amendment terms live in the booking contract, which is where anything with a deadline attached belongs.
Tell us the stairs, not the boxes
Both addresses, what floor each one is on, where a vehicle can legally stand at either end, and the widest thing you own. That is what sets the crew — and the crew is what sets the price.