There is no licence you need in order to call yourself a removal company. A firm carrying other people’s goods for hire or reward in Great Britain in a vehicle over 3,500 kg gross plated weight does need a goods vehicle operator licence from the Traffic Commissioner, so the barrier is genuinely low only for firms running vans under that weight.1 Add a high proportion of one-off customers and you have a trade that rewards firms who are good at quoting and punishes customers who cannot tell the difference. Almost every genuine horror story in this industry traces back to one of five things, and all five are checkable in about half an hour. This guide is the checking. It sits alongside the rest of our removal guides.
Key takeaways
- Insist on a survey, in person or by video. A price given over the phone from a room count is a guess, and guesses get corrected on moving day at your expense.
- Verify trade membership on the association’s own website, never from a logo. Search the firm at bar.co.uk directly. Misused badges are one of the commonest signs of a rogue operator.
- Ask one question about insurance: what is your per-item liability limit? Most firms’ terms cap it at around £40 an item, but it varies, so get your firm’s own number in writing. A firm that will not give one has told you something.
- Deposits of around 25 per cent are common. A larger share up front is not proof of anything on its own, but ask what protects the money if the firm fails, and pay by card rather than cash where you can.
- Get the quote in writing, itemised and fixed, and check what triggers an extra charge before you sign rather than after.
- Three surveyed quotes is the right number. One is no comparison and five is a week you do not have.
What actually separates one firm from another
Price is the thing everyone compares and the worst single predictor of how a move goes. Three quotes for the same house can differ by hundreds of pounds and mean completely different things:
- The cheapest is often the least specified. It may exclude packing materials, dismantling, parking, stairs above the first floor, or the second van it will turn out to need.
- The most expensive is not automatically the safest. It may simply include a full packing service you did not ask for.
- The useful comparison is like for like, which is only possible once each firm has surveyed the same house and written down the same things.
What genuinely varies between firms is whether they have looked at your house, what their contract says they owe you if something is broken, whether they are accredited by a scheme you can check, and what happens when something goes wrong. Those are the four things this guide checks.
The survey is the whole thing
A removal quote is a volume calculation. Until someone has seen what you own and how it gets out of the building, any number is a guess, and guesses are corrected on the day when you have no leverage at all.
In person or video, both are fine
Most reputable firms now offer a video survey and they work well. You walk the house on a call, open cupboards, show the loft, and the surveyor records it. The recording is arguably better than an in-person visit, because an estimator can pause and replay it while building the quote rather than relying on notes made while you talked.
What matters is not the format but the coverage. A proper survey looks at:
- Every room, plus loft, garage, shed and under the stairs. The forgotten spaces are where the extra van comes from.
- The big and awkward items: piano, safe, American fridge freezer, corner sofa, wardrobe that will not come apart.
- Access at both ends: floor level, lift or stairs, stairwell turns, and how far the van can park from the door.
- Parking, including whether a bay suspension or permit is needed. Our guide to moving into a flat covers what that costs.
- What is not going, so you are not quoted for furniture you are selling.
Tip: send every firm the same 60 second phone video of both entrances, the street and the stairs or lift, whether or not they ask. It is the fastest way to get comparable fixed prices and it removes the “we didn’t know about the stairs” conversation before it happens.
Watch out: a firm that offers a firm price over the phone without seeing anything is not being efficient. It is either quoting low to win the booking and correcting on the day, or it has no intention of holding the price at all.
Reading a quote properly
Get it in writing, itemised, and with the total clearly marked as fixed or estimated. Then check these specific things, because they are where quotes differ without looking as if they do.2
| Check | What you are looking for |
|---|---|
| Fixed or hourly | Fixed after a survey is preferable. Hourly rates transfer every delay onto you |
| Crew size and vehicle | Named, so a two-person crew does not turn up for a four-person job |
| What is included | Materials, dismantling and reassembly, appliance disconnection, floor protection |
| Packing | None, fragile-only, or full. These are three very different prices |
| Stairs and carry distance | Whether an upper floor or a long carry adds a surcharge, and how much |
| Parking | Who applies for a suspension, who pays, and what happens if it is not granted |
| Waiting time | What it costs if keys are late, which is common and rarely free |
| Cancellation and postponement | The charges, how sharply they rise in the final week, and whether the statutory 14-day cancellation right applies because you booked at a distance by phone, email or online3, 4 |
| Liability and cover | The per-item limit, the aggregate cap, and what extended cover costs |
| VAT | Whether the headline figure includes it |
Ask for the terms and conditions with the quote, not after you accept. A firm that treats that as an unusual request has told you how the rest of the relationship will go.2
Compare surveyed quotes, not guesses
Every company listed here has its insurance checked as part of onboarding.
Compare removal quotesTrade membership, and how to verify it
Accreditation is the credential you can check from your sofa. Schemes differ in what they actually give you when something goes wrong, so it is worth knowing what sits behind the badge rather than treating them all as the same reassurance.
The British Association of Removers
BAR members are inspected on joining and audited annually against a code of practice approved under the Chartered Trading Standards Institute scheme, with an accredited independent dispute resolution service and an independent disciplinary committee behind it. In practice that buys you four things:
- Cover you have to be offered. A member must either offer you insurance meeting BAR’s minimum standards for your goods or, if it offers none, accept liability under the removal contract and hold insurance sufficient to meet that liability. Public liability cover is separately compulsory.2 With a non-member you are taking their word for it, or asking for the certificates, which you should do anyway.
- An advance payment guarantee, which is narrower than it sounds. It is a last-resort scheme, triggered only once the member has formally been placed into liquidation — administration, or simply ceasing to trade, does not activate it — and it pays the reasonable cost of getting your move completed, up to the amount you had already paid, rather than refunding your deposit. Credit card payments are excluded and it is capped at £50,000 for any one firm’s failure.5, 2 Pay a deposit of more than £100 by credit card and you have a claim against the card issuer under section 75 of the Consumer Credit Act instead, up to £30,000, whether or not the firm belongs to any scheme.6
- A published complaints standard, with an acknowledgement and resolution timetable rather than silence.2
- Access to an ombudsman if the firm’s own process deadlocks.7, 2 Against a non-member your escalation route is the small claims court, which is slower and has fees up front.8, 2
Move Assured
Another UK accreditation scheme, which checks a firm’s insurance and business details before accrediting it. What a scheme offers you if something goes wrong differs from one to the next, so read what its accreditation covers rather than assuming every badge carries the same protections.
Watch out: a logo is not a membership.2 Rogue firms put association badges on their websites precisely because the badges are worth something. Search for the company at bar.co.uk yourself and check the membership number matches what the firm has told you. If the badge shown is Move Assured, search the firm in its directory of accredited members, which gives a page per firm rather than a number to match. This is a two minute check and it is the single highest-value one on this page.
Checks that cost nothing
- Companies House. Look up the registered company. Check it exists, is active, and has been trading longer than the website suggests. A firm incorporated last month with a decade of testimonials is worth a second look.9, 10
- The address. A real depot rather than a residential address or a mail forwarding box.
- The landline and the domain. A mobile number and a free email address are not disqualifying on their own, but with everything else they form a pattern.
- Reviews, read properly. Ignore the score and read the negative ones. What you want to see is a firm answering complaints, because how a company behaves when something breaks is exactly what you are buying.
The insurance question
“We’re fully insured” is the most misleading sentence in the trade, because the firm’s own goods in transit policy exists to protect the firm, not to make you whole.2 Both of the policies a firm will wave at you cover the firm’s own liabilities: goods in transit answers for what it owes on the load it is carrying, and public liability answers for injury or damage to other people and their property, which is not your furniture. Neither one is a promise to pay you what your things are worth.
What you can actually recover is set by the liability clause in the contract you sign. Most firms’ terms cap what they owe you per item — commonly around £40, though it varies, and some define an item as the entire contents of a box. Find that clause before you sign, and ask one question in writing:
“What is your standard per-item liability limit, and is there an aggregate cap on the load?” The per-item figure is commonly around £40; whether there is an overall cap on the whole load, and what it is, varies from firm to firm, so get both in writing rather than assuming. A firm that will not put a number in an email is not a firm you want carrying everything you own.
Then decide separately whether to buy extended cover from the mover, rely on your home contents policy, or accept the risk. Our guide to removals insurance works through all three, including the exclusion that catches most people: most firms’ terms exclude breakages in boxes you packed yourself, so check that clause too.
Red flags, in order of seriousness
- Cash demanded for the full move price. Pay by credit card where you can: section 75 gives you a claim against the card issuer on anything over £100 and up to £30,000. Cash or bank transfer loses you that protection and the paper trail with it, and leaves a BAR member’s advance payment guarantee as the only backstop you have.6, 5
- A large payment up front with nothing protecting it. Around 25 per cent on booking is common, and a bigger advance is not proof of anything by itself — some long-established firms ask for more. What matters is how you are asked to pay it and what happens to the money if the firm fails.
- No survey offered, and a firm price anyway. The two do not go together.
- No written terms, or terms only after you pay.
- A trade logo that does not appear on the association’s register.
- Refusal to email the goods in transit certificate. Any established firm sends this the same day.
- A quote far below three others. It is usually an unsurveyed guess or a firm without proper cover, and occasionally it is a price that grows once your possessions are in a van.
- Pressure to book today for a discount that expires. Removal capacity does not work like that.
- No landline, no depot address, no company number.
- Vague answers about who actually turns up. Some firms subcontract. That is not automatically wrong, but you should know, and the cover should follow.
Watch out: the specific scam to know about is the price that rises once the van is loaded, with your possessions as leverage. A surveyed fixed price in writing, from a firm you verified on a trade register, is what makes that scenario extremely unlikely.
The twelve questions
Ask every firm the same twelve, in writing where you can. The answers, not the price, are the comparison.
- Will you survey the property, in person or by video? Any answer other than yes ends it.
- Is the quote fixed or estimated, and what changes it?
- What is your standard per-item liability limit? Commonly around £40, but ask for your firm’s own figure and where it sits in the terms.
- Is there an aggregate cap on the whole load?
- What does extended cover cost, and is it new-for-old or indemnity?
- Are boxes I pack myself covered for breakage? Most firms’ terms say not, so ask what fragile-only packing costs.
- Are you accredited by BAR or another scheme, and under what name or number? Then verify it on that scheme’s own website.
- Can you email your goods in transit and public liability certificates?2 They are two different covers and both protect the firm — one for its liability for the load, one for injury or damage to other people and their property. Neither sets what you get back; question three does that.
- What deposit do you take, when, and is it protected?
- What are the cancellation and postponement charges? A charge out of all proportion to what your cancelling costs the firm, or a deposit it keeps with nothing owed the other way when it is the one cancelling, can be challenged as an unfair term.11
- Who handles parking, and what if a suspension is refused?
- What is your complaints process and how long does it take?
Tip: book four to six weeks ahead, six to eight in the June to September peak, and eight to twelve for long distance or a larger home. Good firms are booked out first, so leaving it late narrows your choice to whoever still has the date, which is exactly the wrong basis for choosing.
Compare firms whose cover we have checked
Insurance documents are verified when companies join, so you start from a shorter list.
Compare removal quotesFrequently asked questions
How do I check a removal company is legitimate?
Four checks, about half an hour in total. Search the firm on the trade association’s own website rather than trusting a logo, because misused badges are common. Look the company up at Companies House and check it is active and has been trading as long as it claims. Ask for the goods in transit and public liability certificates by email, which any established firm sends same-day. Finally, insist on a survey, since a firm price without one is a guess.
How many removal quotes should I get?
Three, all based on a survey of the same property. One quote gives you no comparison, and beyond three or four you are spending days for diminishing returns. The important part is that they are like for like: the same house, the same inventory, the same packing option, and the same access information. Otherwise you are comparing prices for different jobs.
Is a deposit normal for a removal company?
Yes. Around 25 per cent on booking is common. Pay it by credit card if you can, because that gives you a claim against the card issuer if the firm fails, on anything over £100. Cash for a sum you would ordinarily put on a card is the thing to push back on. If the firm is a BAR member, ask whether the deposit is covered by the advance payment guarantee — but know what that is: a last-resort scheme that bites only once the member is formally in liquidation, pays the cost of completing your move up to what you had already paid rather than refunding you, and excludes credit card payments.5
What does BAR membership actually get me?
Four things. Cover you have to be offered: the member must either offer you insurance meeting BAR’s minimum standards for your goods or accept liability under the contract and hold insurance to meet it, with public liability cover compulsory on top. An advance payment guarantee, which is a last-resort scheme paying the cost of completing your move if the member goes into liquidation, rather than a refund of your deposit. A Trading Standards approved code of practice with a published complaints timetable. And access to an ombudsman if the firm’s own process deadlocks. Against a non-member your escalation route is the small claims court instead. Verify any claimed membership on bar.co.uk yourself.
Should I choose the cheapest removal quote?
Only if it is like for like with the others and the firm passes the checks. A quote well below three others usually explains itself: no survey, so the price is a guess that grows on the day; or exclusions such as materials, dismantling, stairs or parking; or no proper goods in transit cover. Compare what is included and what the per-item liability is before you compare totals.
Is a video survey as good as someone visiting?
For most moves, yes, and sometimes better. The estimator can pause and replay the footage while building the quote instead of working from notes taken during a walkthrough. What matters is coverage rather than format: every room plus loft, garage and shed, the awkward items, and the access at both ends. A very large house or an unusual item is still worth an in-person visit.
How far in advance should I book a removal company?
Four to six weeks for a standard move, six to eight in the June to September peak, and eight to twelve weeks for long distance or a larger home. Most firms can work with about seven days at short notice, but at that point you are choosing from whatever is left rather than choosing properly, and you will pay peak rates for the privilege.
What if the price goes up on moving day?
With a surveyed fixed price in writing it should not, and that is precisely why the survey matters. Genuine extras exist, such as waiting time when keys are late, or a parking suspension that was refused, which is why you should check those clauses before signing. A demand for significantly more money once the van is loaded, with no basis in the written terms, is the scenario the checks in this guide are designed to prevent.
Sources
Figures, deadlines and rules in this guide are referenced below. Each source was checked on 10 August 2026. Links open in a new tab.
- GOV.UK (Traffic Commissioners for Great Britain / DVSA), (2026).
- British Association of Removers, (2022).
- legislation.gov.uk, (2013).
- legislation.gov.uk, (2013).
- British Association of Removers, (2020).
- legislation.gov.uk, (1974 (as amended)).
- Dispute Resolution Ombudsman / Furniture & Home Improvement Ombudsman, (May 2026).
- GOV.UK (HM Courts & Tribunals Service), (2026).
- GOV.UK (Companies House), (2026).
- Companies House, (2026).
- legislation.gov.uk, (2015).