The two deadlines that decide whether an office move works
Most office move checklists open at the three month mark. That is comfortably too late for the two items that can cost you a year of rent or leave a team without connectivity in a building you are already paying for.
Here is the gap, set out plainly.
| Task | Where most checklists put it | What it actually needs | Cost of getting it wrong |
|---|---|---|---|
| Review the lease and the break clause | Rarely mentioned | 12 to 18 months before the break date | Break fails, lease continues to the next break, possibly years |
| Serve the break notice | Not covered | Commonly 6 months, sometimes 12, per the lease | One day late and the notice is invalid |
| Order the internet connection | 1 month before | At lease signature, 60 to 90 working days for a leased line | Paying rent on an office your team cannot work in |
| Commission a dilapidations schedule | Not covered | 9 to 12 months before | An unbudgeted claim after you have gone |
| Book the removals firm | 2 to 3 months before | 2 to 3 months before, which is about right | Limited, this one is usually fine |
The rest of this checklist runs as a countdown. Work backwards from your break date, not forwards from today.
Twelve to six months out: the lease is the whole game
This section is where the money is, and it is the part a removals firm cannot help you with. Get a commercial property solicitor onto it early. We are movers, not lawyers, and the sums involved here dwarf what you will spend on the move itself.
The conditions attached to a break are where most tenants come unstuck:
| Condition | The trap |
|---|---|
| All rent paid up to date | Landlords sometimes argue this includes insurance rent, service charge and interest. Small arrears at the break date can invalidate the notice even if paid days later |
| Vacant possession | Left furniture, rubbish, a sub-tenant still in occupation, or partition walls you installed and did not remove can all defeat it |
| Compliance with covenants | A requirement to have complied with every lease obligation is very hard to satisfy. Audit against it well in advance |
| Correct service | Served on the right legal entity, at the address in the notice clause, by the method the lease specifies |
Two things to action in this window. Commission a schedule of dilapidations so you know the size of the reinstatement bill before it becomes a claim. And dig out the schedule of condition from when you took the lease, if one exists, because it is the single most useful document you own in a dilapidations argument.
Moving a workplace?
Offices, shops, studios and workshops moved out of hours so you lose as little trading time as possible. Send the addresses and your target date to get started.
Six to three months out: connectivity is not an IT job, it is a property job
This is the item we see fail most often, and it fails because it gets filed under IT. It is not an IT task. It is a property task with an IT label, because the critical path runs through surveys, landlord permissions and sometimes the council granting a permit to dig up a pavement.
What to do, in order:
- Establish what is already in the building before you sign anything. A pre-lit building with fibre already terminated can be live in days. A building with nothing can take a quarter of a year.
- Place the order at lease signature. Every source we checked says the same thing, and it is the single most repeated piece of advice in the connectivity trade.
- Start the wayleave conversation immediately. Landlord paperwork is the most common single cause of delay, and it is entirely outside your provider’s control.
- Arrange a bridge. If the leased line will not land in time, plan a temporary connection rather than discovering the problem on day one.
- Do not forget the old line. Overlapping contracts on two buildings are cheaper than a gap, but only if you have decided that deliberately.
Book the removals firm in this window too. Two to three months is realistic for a business move, and it is when a surveyor can still walk both buildings before your plans are fixed.
Three months to one month: the building, the plan and the people
The practical list:
- Agree the new floor plan and desk allocation. Furniture arriving with nowhere assigned is the most common cause of a slow unload, and a slow unload is what pushes a move into Monday morning.
- Survey both buildings for access. Lift dimensions, door widths, stair turns, where a vehicle can legally stand, service yard hours and whether there is a goods lift that actually works.
- Get the landlord’s rules in writing at both ends. Permitted move times, protection requirements for lifts and common parts, insurance certificates the building manager wants to see, and out of hours access arrangements.
- Confirm the IT cutover plan with whoever runs your IT. The move should be planned backwards from the moment staff need to log in, not forwards from when the van arrives.
- Brief staff. What they pack, what they do not, what happens to their kit, when they will be working from home, and where they go on the Monday.
- Order what needs a lead time. Signage, access cards, keys, additional furniture, and anything bespoke.
If your dates do not line up cleanly, and with two leases involved they frequently do not, plan for the gap now rather than improvising. A phased move with interim storage is usually cheaper and far less risky than trying to compress everything into one weekend.
Six weeks out: the address changes almost everyone gets wrong
This is the section where checklists tend to say “update your address” and move on. It is more involved than that, and some of it carries deadlines.
| Who | How | Deadline |
|---|---|---|
| Companies House | Form AD01, online or by post, no fee | Within 14 days of the change |
| HMRC, Corporation Tax | Passed on automatically by Companies House | Verify it landed rather than assuming |
| HMRC, VAT | VAT online account or form VAT484, separately | Within 30 days |
| HMRC, PAYE | PAYE online, separately | Promptly |
| Local council | Business rates at both the old and new premises | Before the move, to avoid paying twice |
| ICO | If you are registered for data protection | Promptly |
| Bank, insurers, licensing bodies | Directly, each one | None are automatic |
| Website, letterhead, order forms | Your registered office must appear on all of them | Once the change is registered |
Two traps worth naming. The registered office change only takes legal effect once Companies House registers it, not when you file it, so leave room. And the registered office must stay within the same UK jurisdiction as your incorporation. Moving a company registered in Scotland to an English address, or the reverse, is a re-registration process rather than a change of address form, and it needs proper advice.
Set up mail redirection from the old address as well. Something always arrives late.
The final fortnight, and the weekend itself
The fortnight before:
- Label to a destination, not a description. A crate marked “finance” helps nobody. A crate marked with a desk or room number on the new plan unloads itself.
- Deal with IT disposal properly. Redundant computers, screens and comms kit fall under electrical waste rules, and drives holding personal data need documented destruction rather than a bin.
- Book confidential waste collection. Old files are a data protection liability, not clutter.
- Confirm the vacant possession position. Everything you installed and are required to remove, out. Everything you are not required to remove, left. Get the distinction from your solicitor, not from a guess.
- Collect keys, fobs and access cards from leavers and from anyone who will not be there on the day.
- Take meter readings and photographs of both buildings, before and after.
On the weekend, the useful principle is that the crew should never have to ask a question. Someone from your side who can make decisions should be present at both ends, the floor plan should be on the wall, and the IT team should know exactly when kit comes off and when it goes back on.
Dates not lining up?
If completion slips or the new place is not ready, we can collect, store and redeliver. Ask for the move and the storage in one quote and see what the gap actually costs.
What changes if the move is in Edinburgh
If you are moving within the city, or into it, add these to the three month window.
- Low Emission Zone. Since 1 June 2024 a diesel vehicle entering the city centre zone must meet Euro 6 and a petrol vehicle Euro 4, enforced 24 hours a day. A non-compliant vehicle receives a £60 penalty charge and repeat entries within 90 days escalate. Check any vehicle before you book it, including hired ones.
- Loading permissions. A City of Edinburgh Council dispensation to load on a yellow line costs £16 per vehicle per location and needs at least 24 hours’ notice. A bay suspension is charged at the street’s own hourly parking rate, which the council’s 2026-27 schedule sets between £4.20 and £9.00, and needs three days excluding weekends for permit bays or two for public bays. Note that a suspension only runs during that bay’s operating hours, so an evening overrun is not covered.
- Delivery windows. Large parts of the Old Town and Rose Street take deliveries only in set morning windows, which effectively decides your move time for you.
- Building stock. A New Town townhouse office over four floors with a shared stair and no goods lift is a completely different job from a modern floorplate, and it needs to be surveyed as one.
We set out how these fit together in practice on our office removals in Edinburgh page, and for shops, studios and trading premises where closed hours are the real cost, on commercial removals in Edinburgh. If you are budgeting rather than booking, our guide to what removal companies charge in Edinburgh covers what actually drives a quote.
When this checklist does not apply
- Serviced or managed offices. Connectivity, furniture and fit-out are the operator’s problem. Your checklist collapses to notice period, IT, address changes and moving people’s belongings.
- Under ten people with laptops. Most of the property planning above is disproportionate. Focus on the lease notice, the connection and the address changes, and treat the physical move as a day’s work.
- A forced or emergency move. If the building has failed or a landlord has served notice, the countdown is gone. Prioritise connectivity, then people, then furniture, in that order, and accept that some of it will be done badly.
- A move where you are not the tenant. If you occupy under licence rather than a lease, most of the break clause section does not apply to you. Check which you have before spending money on advice.
Questions people ask about planning an office move
How far in advance should you plan an office move?
Twelve to eighteen months if there is a lease break involved, because the break clause review and the notice period drive everything else. Six months is workable where the lease is ending naturally. Under three months is possible but you will be paying a premium somewhere, usually on connectivity or on accepting a worse building.
What is the most commonly missed item on an office move checklist?
The internet connection, because it gets treated as an IT task rather than a property one. A leased line commonly takes 30 to 90 working days and can be held up indefinitely by a landlord wayleave. The order should go in when the lease is signed.
Who do you legally have to notify when a business changes address?
Companies House within 14 days via form AD01, which is free. That passes to HMRC for Corporation Tax only. VAT must be updated separately within 30 days, and PAYE, the ICO, your local council for business rates, your bank, insurers and any licensing body all need telling individually. Your registered office must also appear correctly on your website and business stationery.
Should the office move happen at a weekend?
Usually, yes, or overnight. The cost of an office move is mostly the trading time or working time it consumes, so the question is not what the removals firm charges but how many hours your business is not operating. A weekend move costs more per hour and often less in total.
Who should be in charge of an office move?
One named person with authority to make decisions on the day, available at both buildings. It does not need to be a facilities specialist. It needs to be someone who can answer where something goes without asking anybody.
Before you start
Find your lease, find the break date, and work backwards from it. Then find out what connectivity already exists in the building you are considering, before you sign for it. Those two answers set the shape of everything else on this list, and both of them are usually decided before a removals firm is ever contacted.
More practical guides are collected in our Edinburgh moving guides.
Lease and break clause points in this guide are general and are not legal advice; commercial lease terms vary and should be checked with a solicitor. Companies House and HMRC notification requirements were checked against published guidance on 31 July 2026. Edinburgh council charges were checked against the City of Edinburgh Council dispensations and suspensions page and the Parking Operations Procedures and Charges schedule for 2026-27. Connectivity lead times are typical industry figures and vary by site.
