Only tangentially a D-I-Y question - I'm trying to find a company who will hire a 7.5 tonne truck, allowing me to pick it up in or near Southend-on-Sea, and return it in or near Cardiff. A couple of hours on the phone and web have produced no joy.
Am I on a hiding to nothing?
Daniele
Most of the large rental companies do trucks (e.g. Sixt, Budget, Enterprise,...)
If you search with Google using
7.5 tonne truck rental uk one-wayyou will find a few more. Several claim to offer one way rentals.
Another option would be to rent truck plus driver for a day.
That's an idea - you mean the driver has his own truck, and goes where he needs to?
Daniele
if Ive got the pick up - drop off right:
probably cheaper to phone a few cardiff based courier companies who do 7.5t and ask them to quote for a backload from southend.
get several quotes.
reason ? there are many courier comapnies in A and a "backload" for a van coming back from B will quote a backload at 30 to 50% of the full rate.
be nice and make sure that there's someone at the pick up point to load the van for the driver. leave a mobile number so that the driver knows who's where, when and that the job is still live.
I guarantee that it will be cheaper than self drive PLUS the load will be insured (G.I.T)
hth
regardless of where you want to go :)
NT
Unfortunately it's the contents of a house... just the loading is going to take a good couple of hours.
Daniele
k. so a 7.5t courier dropping at southend at 9am, you and family+ dog pack the day before, ensure that you are ready to load up while the driver (on a tacho) has a rest. it's still a backload and still cheaper than hiring a removals company or hiring a van.
nah, sod it. call a removals company. you know it makes sense.
Either that or rental company supplies truck and driver.
Of course, implication is that driver would have to return to origin.
Stupid question, but wouldn't it be easier to rent the truck in Cardiff and drive it both ways?
No, it's not like that. I'm moving my father to Cardiff, and due to various complicated circumstances which I won't bore you with, it's going to be a $@%!£ nightmare. If throwing £1200 at a removals company would take the nightmare away I'd do it with shivering delight, but unfortunately that is not going to help.
One thing that would help immensely would be the possibility of a one-way rental. Otherwise, it might actually make more sense to rent a truck in Southend and return it there, because there's also a car to be brought over to Cardiff. Sigh.
Daniele
do it. enjoy the shiver of simplicity. problem one solved.
get a lift in the removals van, settle your father in, drive the car back.
problem two solved.
anything else is taking the piss/needlessly adding complications = stress
hth
You'll need humpers to load up anyway, so have one of them drive the car back.
In message , D.M. Procida writes
I've done many a one-way rental of large vans (3.5t+) from
Anyway, ignore the website, give your local and/or nearby office a call and see what they can do.
There has been a mention on here of backloads to Cardiff - if you can be flexible with "when" then yes that's a good idea, they're usually the cheapest option. A Cardiff/South Wales haulier with a truck loose in the Southend/South Essex Area may be obliging but as a rule the handballing/waiting is a no-no for them.
Also bear in mind that the back of your average haulage/groupage/national truck isn't a "furniture lorry" and is usually the sort of place you'd never want to put your sofa :-)
If you're stuck for some names/numbers of Cardiff firms, give me a shout (on here) and I'll dig some out for you.
"D.M. Procida" wrote in message news:1h9ffag.1t87c6np6ch7lN% snipped-for-privacy@apple-juice.co.uk...
Plenty of good advice from others, but may I suggest caution about the choice of vehicle? Furniture removal vans aren't usually general purpose trucks: they often have oversize bodies (don't we all) perhaps extending over the cab ("Luton" bodies), and an internal step arrangement at the back. Lifting furniture to the full height of a load deck of even a 7.5 tonner isn't fun. Tail lifts are another possibility, and great if you've got a piano to shift, but are slow to use. Any van hired out for general purpose use may not be very clean inside.
Remember also the odds and sods of equipment that removal men use, for good reason: sack trucks, wheeled dollies, packing cases, thick old blankets, and the real revelation once you've tried them for yourself, lengths of webbing strap - wrap round your wrist, hold in the palm, form a sling under, say, a heavy chest of drawers, and repeat layout with other hand and wrist. It means you lift with your back straight and your head out of the way.
Last tip: if you're not used to driving things that big, remember its height - not only the obvious low bridge problem, but the fact that road camber can tilt the top closer to shop blinds, lamp posts, and so on.
Of course, generally you just end up doing what everyone else does with the taillift, setting it halfway between road and floor and using it as a stair. I wouldn't be without one on a 7.5t.
Christian.
I've done removals when I was weight training. the bloke I worked for told me he allows 2 hours per room plus travelling time for the entire job and that's if everything was boxed, labled, and ready to go on arrival of the van.
often it wasn't and the job over ran. a lot.
eh ? you know about handballing, and generally, couriers wont't do removals but why no mention of waiting time ? depending on the sixe of the vehicle it's usually between £8 and £20 / hour + VAT
it's all about MTVan.com and courier exchange these days :-)
Must have been big rooms, or was it just you and him?
It took the team of removers 7 hours at most I guess to load up our house (7 rooms plus lots of garage and garden stuff) and that included packing most of the house contents - between 4 and 6 blokes working on the job.
Unloading at the other end, but not unpacking most stuff was about 5 hours I guess
I should qualify that - number of BEDrooms x 2 hours + travelling time, is what he allowed on a van that could do up to a 4/5 bed house. he used to drop the boxes off a few days beforehand and it was mostly all packed by the time we got there.
there were 2 vans, usually three bods per van. sometimes four. it really does pay to get a small removal firm in, he used to charge about £400 - £450 for a 3bed house, ish, but that was about 6/7 years ago. both vans were worked 7 days a week.
Why not?
If you explain the problem properly then we might be able to suggest a solution. If you can be packed in time to load a rental van (assuming you're only having it for a day) then surely you can be packed in time for removal men and they will do all the humping.
If your father is has medical complications then ask the local social services if they can offer any help in transporting him. You may have to pay, though.
MBQ
Is it possible (legally and practically) to tow a trailer behind the type of van that you want? Then you could trailer the car behind the van.
Owain
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