Moving to house hours away. Tachograph Advice needed

PJ_queen

My sister is due to move house 4 hours from her current house. She had a company in to quote and due to distance they said it would take 2 days. I understand the distance issue but they said even if they sent 2 drivers it would still be 2 days as the tacho relates to the vehicle and not the driver which I don’t understand and just wanted confirmation as I just assumed it related to the drivers hours and not the vehicle.

tacpot12

You are right to query this. The tacho relates to drivers hours and has nothing to do with the vehicle other than the vehicle needs to have a tachograph.

However, I think the answer lies in the fact that the driver's hours also cover other work. So if it is a four hour drive, and the unloading is expected to take two hours, the driver has worked six hours. If he then has to drive back, he might have done 10 hours work. 

I'm not an expert in this area, but I would have thought that a second driver is a solution to the problem. I've been on coaches that drive to the Spain, where there are two drivers who take turns so that both operate within the rules for working hours (the coach was driven continuously apart from fuel stops, where the drivers changed over as necessary). So I can't see that the time spent in the cab not driving prohibits the second driver from returning, but as I say I'm not an expert. 

If the quote is too high, get a second one and see if the other firm make the same claims. 

stuhse

Id suggest getting quotes from a few companies, try ones both in the home and destination towns.

Herzlos

The tacho relates to the driver's hours and not the vans. The van must be fitted with a tacho but each driver should have a card.

Where it gets more complicated is that when the other driver is the passenger, the time counts as a break and not a rest, so you can't double the driving time with a 2nd driver on board. Time travelling to the van also counts as work, so you couldn't have the 2nd driver meet you there for the drive home.

If the driver didn't do any loading, and the van started at the first house, you could potentially get away with the return trip in a day, but would run the risk of going over if any problems occurred.

How far away is the yard from the first house and where's that in relation to the second house?

Say you've got something like this:

(yard) ---1h --- (start) ---------- 4h ----------- (end)

That means just driving from yard to start to end to yard could take 10 hours and be over time, whilst:

(start) ---1h--- (yard) ----- 3h---------(end)

Would only take 8 hours.

So yeah, it's going to be much easier to treat it as a 2 day job.

Section62

PJ_queen said:

My sister is due to move house 4 hours from her current house. She had a company in to quote and due to distance they said it would take 2 days. I understand the distance issue but they said even if they sent 2 drivers it would still be 2 days as the tacho relates to the vehicle and not the driver which I don’t understand and just wanted confirmation as I just assumed it related to the drivers hours and not the vehicle.

I don't think there is an hours restriction on the vehicle itself, but the company may be using the term "vehicle" to mean the team as a unit. (like 'one fire engine' would be understood to be the vehicle plus crew)

AIUI the rules on double manning mean the second driver has to be 'resting' properly during their breaks, not doing anything which could be considered 'work'.

At a guess, the company have figured out the number of people and time taken doesn't allow the work to be done within a 1-day charging period.  For example, if a second driver goes then that would be one less seat for a shifter, and if the driver needs to rest rather than work then they can't be shifting boxes - meaning the unloading/unpacking would take longer overall, and would also eat into the other driver's hours.

LoopyLoops

We moved 5 hours and it was a 2 day move.  We got 3 quotes.  As others have explained it’s not just the hours they are driving.  We ran over as there was a delay in the money at completion and it meant one of our movers couldn’t drive the next day at another job although he wasn’t driving for us, so this affected his wages.  (He wasn’t complaining, we were just chatting). It’s quite complicated.  If the movers say 2 days they have counted for everything.  They don’t want to drag out work any longer than they have to, well not in my experience anyway!  

Grumpy_chap

The obvious thing here would be to obtain competitive quotes so that the value (or otherwise) can be established.

Tacho cards belong to the driver, not the vehicle.  If there is a change of driver during the day, the second driver changes the tacho cards.  However, the comparison to long distance coach drivers made upthread may not be wholly applicable.  Coaches are equipped with proper rest / sleep compartments where the second driver can properly sleep while the vehicle is in motion.  The removal vehicle may not be so equipped, a driver simply sitting in the passenger compartment is still alert and not properly resting.

It also may not make any difference to the cost whether the job is completed in one day or two.  The crew are not fit to work on another job the following day.
Let's consider a scenario:

• Packing complete the day before the move.  Everything boxed ready to load.
• Moving day, crew leave the yard 07:30  (had to leave home another half hour before that).
• 08:00 arrive to start loading the vehicle.  Takes 4 hours.
• 12:00 = half hour lunch break.
• 12:30 crew depart on 4-hour drive.  Assume no traffic delays.
• 16:30 crew arrive at new house.  Assume completion has taken place and access is immediately available.
• Crew unload the vehicle into the new house, delivering items to the correct rooms.  Takes 6 hours.
• 22:30 crew ready to depart.  Half hour meal break.
• 23:00 crew depart on home journey.  Takes 4 hours.  Assume no traffic delays.
• 03:00 day after removal, crew arrive back at yard.  Still need another half hour to get home.

That crew will not be able to work the day after removal regardless so the person with the long distance move has to cover that stand-down time.
It is probably safer all round that the crew that set out from home at 07:00 are not still arriving home at 03:30 the following morning without proper rest periods.  The two-day approach also allows for delays that might naturally be expected to occur in the whole moving process, traffic, weather, etc.

In fact, I would be rather nervous of any company that offered to undertake this removal on a one-day basis.  

The overnight move might be better for the individual that is moving.  They can get to the new house the first day, but stay in a local hotel.  Once access to the house is possible, the new occupants can clean right through during the evening, hoover, wash down etc.  Then the moving crew arrive the second day and unload into position, with the occupants happy that furniture has not been set down on rubbish and dirt.

Tabieth

Yeah, get other quotes and see. 

I’ve moved house over distance a few times. It’s always been done over two days. 

PJ_queen

Thanks everyone for the replies. It seems to be not as cut and dried as I thought. I will get her to get another quote for just in case

hugheskevi

I recently moved house, with an expected driving time of at least 4 hours each way (it was a move of nearly 200 miles) going from London to east Cheshire.

I got 3 quotes. The first was from a company in East Cheshire who quoted it as 2 day job costing £2,750. The other two quotes were from London companies. One did not say whether it would be one day or two days. I chose a company costing £1,350 to do it in one day (the other quote was much higher).

The day went something like:

• Arrive 9am with 3 men to load (I offered to start earlier, but they preferred 9am)
• 11:30am - loading complete, one guy left, the other 2 drove in the van
• 5pm - arrive
• 7:30pm - loading and furniture rebuilding completed
• 8pm - depart after eating

I suspect they would have got back to London just after midnight. The day went about as well as could be hoped - it couldn't have been done much quicker than the approximately 15 hours it took.

The company in Cheshire that quoted was well-established and reputable. The London companies were small family businesses in the local area.

Skiddaw1

We relocated from the south (Berkshire) to the north (northern Cumbria). What I suggest is that your sister approaches removal companies in the area she's moving to. That's what we did (and what friends of ours who moved from the south to the far north of Scotland also did). Chances are they'll be moving someone in her direction and can then combine it with moving her. That's how it worked with us (so they could get our stuff up to Cumbria in tandem with us getting to the new house).