Making the Move

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Making the Move

Stacy Wilder

Director, Project Management

Julien J. Studley Inc.

Make sure proper insurance certificates are on file at both locations so that the vendor, mover or installer is not stopped during the process. Landlords will not permit a vendor to be on site without proper insurance, so do all the paperwork upfront for existing and new landlords.

Create a vendor contact list. For instance, phone service providers should be able to respond within minutes. You need to set that up because a lot of people don’t work Saturdays and Sundays.

Have a strong information technology staff, consultant or vendor who’s actually going to help power down and de-install the computers, and have a very detailed schedule to come back to the new location and bring them up. Copiers should be moved by the leasing company because they are under warranty and remain under their responsibility.

Dennis Doody

President

Blue Chip Moving & Storage Co.

Have specific people in the company that are responsible for the move the less being better so there’s a point of contact at all times. Make sure that person knows every detail for the move. A lot of times, the person who organized the move doesn’t even know the actual date when the lease is to take effect.

Give the company moving time. If a company would just shut down for three hours on a Friday so that employees pack up their offices and properly sticker everything for the movers, it saves a lot more time than doing that on Monday.

Leave yourself a gap of a couple days after the build-out is scheduled to be done. The fire marshal may come in and find something to prevent a certificate of occupancy from being given.

Bill Saleebey

Regional Manager, Corporate Relocation

American Moving & Storage Inc.

It’s never too early to get a budgetary figure. Anywhere from three to six months out is not too early. If they’re moving furniture and there are not any real difficult items such as libraries or files, you could figure $1 a square foot as a baseline number. What can make it go up quite a bit is if they have a large library or file system.

Understand the building requirements, specifically the mover’s access to the building. If one building’s management says you can’t move during the day, and the other building says you can’t move during the night, you’ve got a big problem. Reserve the elevator, and, if appropriate, the dock, for the move.

Purge as much nonessential stuff as possible. If you have paperwork, get dumpsters out there in advance of the move and get rid of excess before moving.

Make sure the moving company has specific experience moving comparable companies, and can show you references. Don’t choose the lowest price.

Don’t try and do too much in an unrealistic period of time. If you’ve got three floors, don’t try and move it over a weekend.

Don’t try to do too much yourself. If somebody with 40 employees says “we’ll move our own boxes,” usually I’ll talk them out of it. When everyone goes over with their five or 10 boxes in their car to try to move it, they may compete with the move, and there may be an injury.

Danny King

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