Office Relocation Without Tears

Whether a business is growing or downsizing, office relocation can be a stressful ordeal, and not just on the individuals tasked with making the move happen. Office relocations can also be financially stressful on a business as a whole because office relocation may require up to several hours of a service blackout. Depending on the type of service being provided, a service blackout of even a few hours could result in several thousand dollars in lost revenue. In order to ensure a timely and efficient office relocation without tears, businesses are encouraged to plan early, do the move right, and remain systematic.

It’s no secret when a lease is set to expire. Businesses should never wait until the last minute to start accepting bids from office relocation companies. By inviting bids early, moving companies will be able to provide their most accurate estimate possible. With several bids on hand, the business planning a move will have more leverage to negotiate with movers for even more savings. While businesses have the potential to save several thousands of dollars in moving expenses by gathering competing bids, the lowest bid is not always the best bid.

Before accepting any bids from moving companies, businesses must ensure they only hire legitimate moving companies. A legitimate moving company is one that is legally allowed to conduct business in the jurisdictions where they move property. Very often, in an effort to cut corners and trim costs, companies will hire unlicensed and unregulated movers. When dealing with illegal moving companies, businesses may not be covered by insurance providers if the movers cause damage to property or, even worse, injure others in the process of moving. In an effort to undercut the competition, illegal moving companies will offer attractive rates that legitimate moving companies would never be able to beat. Of course, in order to avoid having to charge higher rates, illegal moving companies skimp on things like licenses, permits, drug tests for drivers, and basic insurance, and then pass the “savings” on to the client. Unfortunately, the money that businesses save by hiring unregulated movers is often spent on replacing damaged property or to cover court costs when one of the parties faces a lawsuit.

Aside from planning ahead and only hiring legitimate help, individuals tasked with organizing and executing office relocations should remember to remain systematic and organized throughout. This advice might seem obvious, but entire office relocations have several moving parts, and it can be easy for one of those parts to cause a chain reaction of events that can lead to damage, injury, lost profits, and missed deadlines. Checklists and clearly labeled packing materials will keep businesses on track and efficient during a move.