What an eighth of a load actually looks like

Everyone underestimates a quarter and overestimates an eighth. Here is what each fraction of our bed holds, measured off jobs we did last month.

The first question on nearly every call is the same one: how much is it? The honest answer is another question — how much of the truck will it fill? — and that is a hard thing to picture over the phone. So here is the bed, in the fractions it is marked in, with what we actually carried in each one.

An eighth · £85

A three-seat sofa on its own. Or a fridge-freezer. Or a double bed, mattress and base, broken down. An eighth is roughly the boot of a large van, and it is the smallest thing we will come out for as a booked job — under that, ring us anyway, because if we are on your street we would rather take it than come back.

A quarter · £140

A small bedroom cleared: bed, wardrobe, chest of drawers, and the bags that come out of them. Or a garage’s worth of garden furniture. This is the most commonly booked size and the one people most often guess wrong — a room that looks crowded is usually a quarter, not a half, once the furniture comes apart.

Three eighths · £190

A garage, packed tight. That is the phrase we use on the phone, and it is literal: a garage of tyres, tins, timber offcuts, bikes and shelving fills three eighths if we pack it, and closer to six if it goes on whole. It is the size where breaking down earns the most.

A half · £245

A one-bed flat, furnished, end of tenancy. Sofa, bed, table, four chairs, white goods, and everything in the cupboards. A half is the point at which we send two crew as a matter of course rather than as an option.

Five eighths and above

A two-bed part-cleared, then a full office strip-out, then a whole house. Past seven eighths we are usually talking about two loads rather than one, and two loads of 1/2 cost less than one load of 7/8 plus a return trip — so we will say so if that is what your job is.

Why the fraction and not the hour

Because you can see a fraction. An hourly rate rewards a crew for being slow and punishes you for a difficult staircase; a fraction of a bed is a number you can check by looking at the truck when we close the tailgate. It is also the only number that is honest about what we are actually selling, which is space on a vehicle and a licence to take it away.

The one thing that changes it is packing, and that is on us, not on you.