The end of the academic year is drawing close and the summer holidays often provide a good time for universities to have refurbishments and buildings works etc carried out or have departments moved from one place on site to another or even between campuses. Whether the institution requires a full relocation or equipment being removed from site to allow works to take place, it will be important to involve the services of a professional removal company. Here’s a few areas to consider to ensure that the entire process is completed with minimal disruption.
Planning
University relocations will involve a lot of planning and the key will be to start early and ensure that key people involved in the move are present at the meetings. Assigning areas of responsibility will help to drive progress and make the task more manageable. Remain communicative with the removals company so that they are aware of progress and any changes to dates etc.
Library relocations
When it comes to an academic library needing to be relocated, a lot of organisation is needed to ensure that the collections are moved without damage and fully reinstated in the required order at the new location.
An experienced remover will be able to deploy packing crews who are used to carrying out such moves. If there are collections of specialist or rare books which needs extra careful handling, discuss these with your mover ahead of time so that they can dedicate the necessary time and resources to ensure that these are appropriately cared for in the move.
It will also be important to discuss the indexing system that the university uses, with the removals company so that they can pack the books sequentially and restore the books in the correct order in the new destination. Always choose a remover who has had experience of these type of packing as failure to move the books in the correct order will cause library staff a very big headache!
Donation before disposal
A relocation will invariably involve some items of furniture and equipment becoming surplus. If the university does decide that they can no longer use certain items, the removal company can help. Speak to the move manager about these items being donated to charitable causes or put to use in community initiatives over and above being disposed of and sent to landfill.
Storage
Depending on the nature of the relocation, bear in mind that there may be a need for some items to go into storage for a period of time. Factor this into the discussion with your removals company and they should be able to advise you on the most appropriate type of storage eg. containerised storage or self access storage depending on how often access will be required to the items etc.
