Chocolate eclair

About to get in touch with removal companies shipping NZ to UK. So just looking for advice, top-tips, hints what to look for, ask, remember when approaching them and choosing one.
My brain is so fried that I can't think straight anymore. I'm pretty much at my break point.
Any good websites I should know about for help with this?

Any help is appreciated thanks.

Pollyana

A few thoughts from my search for the same from Aus to UK.

Do you want them to pack for you, or are you happy packing your own boxes?
If packing yourself, get proper strong boxes ad lots of bubble wrap!
Are you looking for storage at either end, or just straight door to door?
A shared container will take longer than sole use
Price up everything replaceable - I spent a lot of time looking at UK prices, which is one reason why I'm not taking much furniture, and no white goods.
As I'm not shipping much furniture, so I just measured stuff and gave the company a list, plus a number of how many boxes & what size they are. They quoted based on that.

Biggest issue was the fact Aussie firms didn't seem interested in quoting unless I could give them a definite date and a large amount of stuff to move. I contacted about 10, only 2 bothered to reply. I'm going with Chess.
When it comes to insurance - Chess quoted me a horrific figure, so I took advice from here and contacted Letton Percival who are about a fifth of the cost, so I will be using them.

Links in this thread were very helpful for my TOR. My list ended up being pretty basic (eg Books x 400, cutlery x 50) and I got approval within 3 days, to my amazement. I didn't have a permanent address to head for so I gave them details of a hotel booking on Booking.com, plus a very basic letter from a family member saying I could stay there if necessary.

Let me know if you have any questions, and good luck!

brits1

Hi, I would decide what you want to ship first ie do you know where your will be staying in the UK and the size of the property if smaller than what you have now then I would decide which items need to be shipped and those you also want to ship them either sell or give away the rest it may save in the size of the container but also you may need items like beds kitchen ware when you first arrive these things can be inexpensive here to buy. If you do not have a UK bank account open one whilst in NZ. Good luck

Pollyana

Opening a UK bank account when non-resident isn't very easy these ays, maybe even impossible now.

ckusa

Many years ago we did a move from the US (DC region) back to the UK. Dealt directly with the shipping company (in Seattle): container (on lorry) arrived at house - had 2 hours to load. Shipped that day out of Baltimore and was ready for offloading in UK 9 days later. Clearly we had to pack everything ourselves and do the heavy lifting, but the price was about 1/3 that of a removal company.

BEVS

VirginOne has decided to close our account with them. Found that out just this Monday from a letter posted to our NZ address last November. ( That's how long some mail is taking to arrive)
We've had the account for maybe 25 years & I didn't wish to relinquish it in case we ever made it back home.

As there is a balance , I spent a good few days trying to track down a bank that would open an account for us as non-resident. That would be without having to deposit an extra large sum into it as per the HSBC requirement, or to make regular payments into it from our pensions. We couldn't afford to do that.

I came up with precisely nothing. So I have opened a Wise a/c as that was what was possible. Next task is to try and transfer the balance over which is not proving easy, despite VirginOne wanting to close the account . This likely means a phone call and security check in the middle of the night as I do not have the apparently required 'card reader' which seems to be a requirement despite that they can send security codes to my mobile phone.

Secure messaging just comes up with generic replies.

*frustration*