Removal associations

Many businesses nowadays have headed paper and office walls that are heaving with the names of the various professional bodies to which they belong. This is all very well when you are choosing a GP or a dentist, but should it matter when you are pondering over which removals company to use? Martin Rose, who is a consultant for the National Guild of Removers and Storers, certainly believes that it does matter, warning that choosing a mover who is not a member of such a body could leave the customer high and dry come moving day, with only the courts as a means of gaining compensation.

“We have plenty of horror stories,” says Rose. “Our members are often rung up late on a Friday because a remover has not turned up and the customer is stuck. All our members operate under a code of practice, so the company is near-guaranteed to turn up on the day of the move. We also promote learning in the industry. Both bodies do a lot of operational training and also management training, so they know how to look after customers and how to run their business.”

There are two main professional associations for removals businesses, these being the National Guild of Removers and Storers (NGRS) and the British Association of Removers (BAR). Both are keen to inform the public that their members are not just unskilled labourers who are simply chosen for their ability to carry heavy items. These associations also operate feedback schemes, which make sure that your moving company is always on their toes and providing the optimum service.

“We have a monitoring service and our members give a quality questionnaire out for every move, which comes back to us,” says Rose, who has also worked for the BAR. “We give out awards each month and every year for excellence and that helps to ensure that our members do the best every time. We also develop terms and conditions of trading, which the customer will be required to sign. They are lodged with the Office of Fair Trading, so they are fair to the customer.”

These bodies may be mostly for the people who are going to come round and move your sofa, kitchenware and CD collection to your new home, but they are, it seems, names well worth noting if you don’t want to be stuck outside on the pavement with your worldly possessions come moving day. Or, for that matter, ever see your worldly possessions again, as NGRS’s Martin Rose points out.

“There was a case in Hull when a company just went off with a load of people’s possessions,” he says. “They were not a part of any industry organisation. Anyone can just set up as a remover. The police were involved.” The case was eventually resolved, but not before a lot of stress for those who had their goods taken by this company, which makes for another good reason to check the credentials of your company before you hand over payment.