The guide
RAMS, Lift Bookings and Building Rules: The London Office Move Paperwork in full
What RAMS actually are, and who reads them
A method statement sets out how the move will be carried out — sequence, crew, equipment, protection, and the route crates and furniture take through the building. The risk assessment lists what could go wrong at those two specific addresses and the controls that stop it. Together they are the RAMS.
Building managers genuinely read them, because the risks are theirs too: a wedged goods lift, a damaged common-part floor or a trolley run across a marble lobby at 22:00. A generic template with someone else's address in it gets rejected, which is why ours are written per job.
Merton: In Merton the building type sets the pace. Business park units and campus buildings with generous vehicle access, single-tenant floors, trade counters and warehouse-attached offices with staff welfare areas. The commercial weight sits around Wimbledon, and that decides crate volumes, how many goods-lift bookings the switchover needs and whether it runs over an evening or a full weekend.
Insurance: the numbers buildings check
Two certificates matter. Public liability covers damage to the building and third parties; most London managing agents want to see at least £5 million. Goods in transit covers your property while it is in our care, and the limit should sensibly exceed the replacement value of what is moving — IT equipment on a 60-desk floor adds up faster than people expect.
If your own contents insurance covers goods in transit already, tell your broker the move dates anyway. Cover often lapses the moment property leaves the insured premises.
Merton: Access in Merton is the part that slips. Site barriers, gatehouse sign-in and estate security patrols, with a van parked at the door and no lift booking to worry about. Championship-fortnight restrictions in SW19, hill access to Wimbledon Village, and driveways common further out. On top of that, the borough is outside the Congestion Charge zone but inside ULEZ, so the access line that moves the price is a bay suspension with London Borough of Merton, booked around ten working days ahead.
- Public liability certificate, typically £5m minimum
- Goods-in-transit certificate with the limit stated
- Employers' liability for the crew
- Waste carrier registration if anything is being removed
Lifts, bays, passes and permits
The goods lift is the bottleneck in almost every multi-storey London move. Slots are usually booked in blocks with building management and, in the tighter towers, come with a lift attendant charged to you. Book both ends the moment the date is fixed — not the week before.
Loading bays are the second constraint. Some buildings own theirs and reserve it; on street loading you may need a bay suspension from the borough, which typically takes several working days and is charged per bay per day. Red routes are TfL's, not the council's, and have their own rules.
Managed buildings also want contractor inductions and passes for named crew. Give the building the crew list a week ahead, and expect sign-in and sign-out records on every visit.
Merton: Sector mix matters to how this plays out locally: Retail and wholesale is the largest employer in Merton at 17.3% of borough jobs, with Administration and support at 12.6%. That shapes what actually gets moved — desk density, server rooms, storage and regulated paperwork all differ by trade, and the survey prices the borough's real mix rather than a generic desk count.
Waste, WEEE and the dilapidations file
Anything you leave behind becomes a dilapidations problem, so clearance is part of the move, not an afterthought. Old desking, pedestals and chairs go out on the same visit under a licensed waste carrier, with a waste transfer note issued for your records.
Electrical items — monitors, PCs, printers, fridges — are WEEE and must be routed through a permitted facility. Keep the transfer notes: landlords and auditors both ask for them, and a photographic record of the cleared floor has settled more than one dilapidations dispute.
Merton: Geography, in practice: Merton covers SW19, SW20, CR4, SM4 across 6 named areas, and 0.36× as many people work here each weekday as live here. Crews are routed to the loading point for the specific postcode, because the run between two addresses inside one borough is rarely the part that costs time — the lift is.