Pricing a removals job without guessing

The three methods, and what each one really trades

Almost every UK removal firm prices one of three ways, and the choice is less about accuracy than about who carries the risk when the day goes long.

1. By volume

   You measure what is going, in cubic feet or cubic metres, from an inventory or a video survey, and price the volume. It is the most common method for full-service moves and the fairest to both sides, because the number you are pricing is the number that decides how big a van and how long a day. It also takes the longest to produce, which is why firms drift away from it under pressure.

2. By the hour

   Standard for man-and-van work. Simple to quote, simple to argue about. The risk sits entirely with the customer, which is why they push back on it for anything large, and the firm carries no penalty for a slow day. Usually written with a minimum charge, commonly two hours.

3. Fixed price

   One number for the whole job, arrived at after a proper survey. The customer prefers it because it removes their risk. That risk has not gone anywhere: it is now yours, which is exactly why the survey stops being optional. Long-distance moves are usually quoted this way.

What the market currently advertises

Useful as a sanity check on whether you are miles off, and useless as a rate card. If your costs do not support these numbers, the numbers are wrong for you, not the other way round.

Two things are worth pulling out of that table. The first is that roughly half an hour of crew time per cubic metre is a more useful planning number than any price, because it converts a survey into a day length, and day length is what actually decides whether a job pays. The second is the regional spread: the same job priced at a national average is materially underpriced in London and overpriced in a lot of the north.

Five things that quietly eat the margin

• Access, which is not a tick box

  Third floor with no lift is not a surcharge, it is a different job. So is a shared stairwell you cannot block, a lift with a booking sheet, and a street where the van legally cannot stop. Ask what floor, ask about the lift, ask where the van can park, and ask at both ends. People do not volunteer their own stairs because to them the stairs are just where they live.

• The garage, the loft and the shed

  Every survey that goes wrong goes wrong in the same three places. They are not in the rooms you walked, they are full, and the customer has genuinely forgotten about them. Ask about all three by name.

• Dismantling

  Wardrobes, beds, the garden trampoline, the American fridge that will not go through the doorway it came through. This is time you can predict and quote for, or time you discover at eight in the morning with a crew standing around.

• The completion that has not completed

  Waiting for keys is the single most expensive hour in removals and it is nobody’s fault. Decide in advance what your waiting time costs, put it on the quote, and tell the customer before the day rather than on it.

• Packing that was assumed either way

  Half the disputes in this trade come from one side thinking packing was included and the other thinking it was not. Say which it is in writing, and price materials separately so the number is visible rather than buried.

Build the quote backwards

The reliable way to price is to work out the day and then price it, rather than pricing the job and hoping the day fits. Start with volume. Convert volume into crew hours. Add the access, the dismantling and the travel at both ends. Now you have a day length, and a day length tells you whether this is one van or two, and whether the crew gets home.

Only then apply your rate. A quote produced this way survives contact with the customer asking for a discount, because you can say precisely what comes out if the price comes down: an hour, a man, or the packing. A quote produced by feel cannot answer that question, and the discount comes out of your margin by default.

Write down what you assumed, too. Every assumption on a quote is a dispute you have pre-emptively settled: the floor, the lift, whether packing is in, what happens if the keys are late. It costs one paragraph and it saves the argument.

Common questions

Should I quote hourly or fixed price?

Hourly suits small, local and unpredictable work where a survey would cost more than the job is worth. Fixed price suits anything large or long-distance, where the customer wants certainty and will pay for it. The mistake is quoting fixed without surveying, which is not a pricing method but a bet.

How do I estimate volume without a full survey?

A video survey is the usual compromise and it is far better than a phone call, because you can see the wardrobe rather than hearing "a wardrobe". Ask the customer to walk every room, and to open the garage, the loft hatch and the shed. If they will not do a video, you are quoting blind and the price should say so.

What should I charge for waiting time?

Whatever an hour of that crew and that van costs you, plus the margin you would have made on the work they are not doing. The number matters less than having it written down before the day, because agreeing it on a driveway at 11am with a stressed customer is not a negotiation you win.

Do I need to include VAT in the quoted price?

If you are VAT registered, prices shown to consumers must include VAT. Business customers usually expect to see the figure excluding it. Removals is one of the trades where a quote that looks 20% cheaper than the competition is often just a quote that has not mentioned VAT yet.

How much should I charge for a deposit?

Enough that a customer who books two firms feels it, and not so much that a reasonable person hesitates. Whatever the figure, the point of it is to make a date mean something. A booking nobody has paid anything against is a pencilled-in maybe.