The guide
Office Relocation Costs in London: What Actually Drives the Price in full
Why office moves are not quoted hourly
A householder can absorb an extra hour. A business cannot absorb an open-ended invoice on a purchase order, and finance will not approve one. So the whole commercial model is different: we survey both addresses, take the risk on how long the building will actually let us work, and quote a single figure.
That also changes who carries the cost of a slow lift or a late bay booking. On an hourly job it is you. On a surveyed project price it is us — which is precisely why the survey matters and why a quote given over the phone without one is usually a placeholder.
Tower Hamlets: What it means for the paperwork here: London Borough of Tower Hamlets handles bay suspensions and any highway permit for Tower Hamlets, while the managing agent handles passes, lift slots and contractor induction. Both are prepared as one document set in your name and submitted five to ten working days ahead, which is the standard lead time across the borough.
The desk bands, and what sits inside them
Desk count is the honest unit for an office move because it scales with crates, IT positions, furniture and crew all at once. Every band below includes the move plan, protection of lifts, floors and door frames, labelling, the RAMS and insurance pack, and the transport itself.
Tower Hamlets: Applied to Tower Hamlets: 18,760 registered businesses sit in this borough and 316,000 people work here, so the step above is usually run for a ten to fifty desk suite rather than a whole tower. 83.8% of firms here employ fewer than ten people, which is why the survey and the switchover normally fit into one weekend.
- Up to 10 desks — from £650, three movers and a Luton, usually one evening
- 11–25 desks — from £1,450, four movers and a 7.5 tonne vehicle, evening plus the following morning
- 26–50 desks — from £2,900, six movers and two vehicles, Friday night to Sunday
- 51–100 desks — from £5,400, eight to ten movers and three vehicles, full weekend switchover
- 100+ desks — from £55 a desk, phased across consecutive weekends
The add-ons that move the number most
Two things reliably shift a quote: IT and timing. Workstation disconnect and reconnect at £28 a desk sounds small until you multiply it by 60, and a weekend switchover adds 18% — which is still almost always cheaper than the trading day it protects.
Crate hire at £3.50 per crate per week is the cheapest line on the sheet and the one most worth over-ordering slightly. Budget roughly two to three crates per desk, plus extras for filing and kitchens.
Tower Hamlets: In Tower Hamlets the building type sets the pace. Grade A towers and refurbished multi-let floors, glass-partitioned meeting suites, client-facing reception areas, high-spec washrooms and staffed hospitality space. The commercial weight sits around Canary Wharf, Isle of Dogs, Spitalfields, and that decides crate volumes, how many goods-lift bookings the switchover needs and whether it runs over an evening or a full weekend.
- Crate hire — £3.50 per crate per week, delivered and collected
- IT disconnect and reconnect — £28 per workstation; server and comms room from £480
- Desk dismantle and rebuild — £18 per position
- Business storage between leases — £22 per pallet per week
- Furniture and WEEE clearance — £180 per load, transfer note included
- Out-of-hours, weekend or bank holiday — 18% uplift on the project price
The building costs that are not on the removal quote
Managing agents commonly charge for out-of-hours security cover, goods lift attendance and sometimes a refundable deposit against damage to common parts. None of that is within a mover's control, so ask both buildings early and put it in the budget as its own line.
Then there is dilapidations. Making good the old floor — removing partitions, patching cable trays, redecorating — is regularly a bigger number than the move itself and is negotiated with the landlord, not the mover. What we can do is document what left the building and when.
Tower Hamlets: Access in Tower Hamlets is the part that slips. Security passes and a permit-to-work, goods lift booked with building management, contractor induction before the first shift and a logged sign-in and sign-out on every visit. Tower blocks with goods-lift booking, Canary Wharf estate permits, and CPZs across Bethnal Green and Bow. On top of that, part of the borough sits inside the Congestion Charge zone and all of it inside ULEZ, so both are priced into the project figure rather than invoiced later.