removal costs, south to north.

barrymoney

Hi -- I am soon moving 230 miles north (Berks to Lancs) and I am getting removal quotes close to £1000 for a small 1 bed house :eek: It seems that the distance is the factor, the amount of stuff I might have seems almost irrelevant to the quote. I do have white goods + bed + basic furniture etc, so man-with-transit-van isn't possible, I think.
I am contemplating having a bonfire of my posessions and simply buying new when I arrive

Thoughts from anyone..? Doesn't that seem expensive?

PasturesNew

At about 220 miles (county to county), the van will take about 5 hours each way.

So straight away the van drivers have done a 10 hour day even if they don't do the actual removal. Add in the time to do the removals, 5 hours? and you're racking up a 15 hour day.

So, with drivers and removal men, that's probably 3 men's wages to pay for 15 hours. No idea how much they're paid, but you're probably charged £20/hour per man minimum. So that's 3x15x£20=£900.

Then add in the cost of diesel. No idea how many mpg those lorries do, but if I take a total guess at 15mpg/3.3mplitre, then a 440 mile round trip is 133 litres. And diesel is, I think, about £1.20/litre, which is another £162.

So you can see how quickly it can get over £1000.

You can play around with the mileages, hourly rates etc, but overall it's a long way, the van has to go two ways and to enable them to make the return journey in one day (rather than billing you for a hotel night) they'd probably be putting 3 men onto the job in my estimation.

And don't forget, they're also paying to buy/lease the lorry, service and maintain it and insure your goods.

There's quite a lot to it.

poppett

Four years ago we moved from the Midlands down to the south coast (3 bed house full of stuff). This cost us £750, so your £1000 quote would be about right.

baileysbattlebus

It's probably quite reasonable, when we moved from Scotland to Berkshire many years ago it cost us more than that because it was a 2 day trip. The rules for drivers are quite strict and you may find they use 2 drivers (more expensive) to complete the job in a day.
An HGV driver is not allowed to drive for more than 4.5 hours with out a 45 minute break and I think if he is assisting in the move it's classed the same as driving.
So ever tighter restrictions for drivers plus fuel / wages / operating costs, I think £1k is quite reasonable.

Jorgan_2

Are you obtaining quotes from firms local to you or from where you are moving to? Firms in Lancs may have lower overheads than those in Berks so they may be cheaper.

barrymoney

Thanks everyone, very helpful!

Yes, I suppose if you break it down, it can easily become 1000 The total cost of moving really does add up to some huge figures.
I think they will do it over 2 days, but I must check all that.

These are quotes from local companies, not lancs, one being Bishops Move (who seem to get good recommendations). I dunno, I think I better just book it and get packing.

Jorgan_2

barrymoney wrote: »

These are quotes from local companies, not lancs, one being Bishops Move (who seem to get good recommendations). I dunno, I think I better just book it and get packing.

I'd get some quotes from Lancashire based firms first. My parents moved from Wokingham to South Wales and there was a massive difference in price between the Welsh based firm & the Berkshire firms.

Make sure your removal company is fully insured as well http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/berkshire/3934205.stm

Which part of Berkshire are you in? I don't know if the guy who moved me is still doing removals, he was more light haulage but did quite a few removal jobs, I can see if he's still doing it if you like.

barrymoney

Jorgan - I will try to find some lancs firms to quote but I am still wary of just picking one 'at random'. I can PM you.

As for the bbc story, sadly I guess its always a risk - yikes. Why break in to a house when you can take the lorry! I am fairly careful already -- e.g. I will take the hard disk from PC and carry it myself Losing a sofa I can probably deal with...

carolan78

The quote seems about right we were quoted £1500 to move from north yorkshire to london last year. It was about 300 miles for a small 3 bed house. This didn't include removal men doing anything bar loading/unloading and driving and no insurance.

We didn't use a removal firm in the end as my dad is a hgv driver so he borrowed a works van for the weekend:j

budget_counsellor_shaz

A local firm did our removals from a 3 bed to a 4 bed for about £850 roughly 220 miles about 5 years ago.

We did it ourselves last year it cost us about £150.........never again:eek: . The stress and hastle the stupid van had a speed limiter and we couldn't drive faster than 50 miles an hour:eek:


Paying removals may not be MSE but we will definately have a removal company next time;)

All the best Shaz

brummybloke

a 1 bed place, you may be better going through your stuff and throwing things you really dont need away.

you may be suprised how much stuff is now tatty , broken or not the sort of thing you now want.

salvation army will come and collect clothing and other stuff as long as it is in decent nick.

then if you know someone who is happy to drive a luton van ( i think on a normal licence as long as the licence is more than 10 years old), look at the cost of that.

you may find, rough guessing £100 for the van hire over a weekend, £100 deisel, £100 to mate to drive the van and help load unload.


£300 sounds a lot nicer than £1k but you have to do the work yourself instead of sitting around, watching others do it for you.