Full pad-wrap protection
Every piece of furniture is individually wrapped in heavy quilted blankets in your home, then only unwrapped once placed in its final position. Far fewer chips and scratches than any standard remover delivers.
Not every move needs a 7.5-tonne lorry and a full pre-pack. For studio flats, 1-bedroom moves, single bulky items, student moves and IKEA collections, our man-and-van service in Eastbourne offers the same trained crews and pad-wrap protection at a lower hourly price point. We are still a BAR-registered firm; we just use a smaller vehicle and bill by the hour rather than as a fixed quote.
Choose one helper or two. One helper is fine for most studio and 1-bed moves; two helpers speed up larger jobs and reduce the hours billed.
Our man-and-van vehicles have load areas of around 600 cubic feet — equivalent to a studio flat or a generously full 1-bedroom flat.
Standard equipment included — pad-wrap blankets, ratchet straps, sack barrows, furniture sliders. No extra equipment fees.
Need boxes too? We can drop materials in advance or you can collect them from our Lower Dicker depot.
Many removal firms advertise "same-day" knowing they will charge a premium when you call. We do not. We will tell you honestly whether we have a crew available today, and if we do, the price is the standard hourly rate. If not, we will offer the next available slot — usually within 24-48 hours during the off-peak season.
| Configuration | From | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Driver + 1 mover, Luton van | £55 / hour | 2-hour minimum, weekday rate |
| Driver + 2 movers, Luton van | £75 / hour | 2-hour minimum, weekday rate |
| Driver + 2 movers, 3.5-tonne | £85 / hour | 2-hour minimum, weekday rate |
| Weekend / evening / bank holiday | +25% | Applied to the relevant hourly rate |
Prices include all standard moving equipment. Long-distance jobs (outside East Sussex) are quoted as a fixed rate rather than hourly.
Our man-and-van service covers the whole BN postcode area and surrounding districts: Eastbourne, Hailsham, Polegate, Pevensey, Willingdon, Uckfield, Heathfield, Bexhill and the surrounding Sussex coast and Weald. We will travel further for the right job — ask us.
Customers sometimes ask whether man-and-van is a "cheaper version" of a full removal. The truthful answer is no — it is a different service for a different job. A full removal is a fixed-price, planned, surveyed move with packing, dedicated lorry capacity and a structured day. Man-and-van is an hourly-billed, smaller-scale service for jobs where a surveyed quote would be overkill. For a 1-bedroom flat move within Eastbourne, man-and-van is almost always cheaper and entirely appropriate. For a 3-bedroom house move, man-and-van billed hourly typically ends up more expensive (and more stressful) than a properly quoted full removal — because the hours add up faster than people expect.
These are the kinds of jobs that make up the majority of our man-and-van bookings around Eastbourne — and the kinds of jobs full-service movers either decline or quote unreasonably high for.
Because the service is billed hourly, the things you can do before the crew arrives translate directly into pounds saved:
Why choose Mark Ratcliffe Moving
Every piece of furniture is individually wrapped in heavy quilted blankets in your home, then only unwrapped once placed in its final position. Far fewer chips and scratches than any standard remover delivers.
A 20% deposit locks your chosen date in. No bumping, no rescheduling for bigger jobs. We hold the slot and we keep it.
No fees for date changes, key waits, cancellations or moves running long. Your quote is your final price — we eat any overrun.
One of only a handful of UK removers with our own staff training facility. Every crew member trains here — including the pad-wrap method, fragile handling and customer service standards.
Individual steel strong rooms at our Lower Dicker depot with 24-hour CCTV. Climate-stable, accessible by appointment, with an antiques tier for high-value contents.
The same name on the lorry as the name on the paperwork. Mark personally surveys every overseas job and every white-glove relocation. Started 1982. Still here.
Eastbourne properties tend to fall into two main groups. Substantial detached commuter homes on the established estates — typically three to five bedrooms, with garages, summerhouses, gym or office conversions and a fair amount of outdoor furniture. And the older village cottages and farmhouses in the surrounding lanes — listed buildings, original fireplaces, low beams and steep stairs that benefit from careful pad-wrap protection on every piece.
Either type lends itself well to a proper in-home survey. We walk every room, count cartons by name and size, photograph the access points and email the quote with itemised pricing within two working days. For straightforward smaller jobs (a single bedroom, a studio flat or a baggage shipment) a phone or video survey is enough. The aim is the same regardless of the property: a fixed, written price that doesn’t move on the day.
Our daily routes out of the Lower Dicker depot put Eastbourne within standard half-day or full-day reach, depending on inventory size and the destination address. A typical Eastbourne pickup with a Sussex or Surrey delivery completes in a single day, including pad-wrapping at the load and unwrapping at the unload. The lorry leaves Lower Dicker in time to be on your driveway ten minutes before the stated load time — we don’t make customers wait around at 6am for a 7am scheduled start.
For chain-day moves out of Eastbourne the timings matter and we plan the schedule from the keys-release time backwards. The conveyancer’s 12 noon or 1pm completion target shapes when we crew up, when we pad-wrap and when we leave the property. For longer-distance UK moves — to the Midlands, the West Country, the north — we generally split the day across two crews if the inventory exceeds a single lorry. Anything heading overseas from Eastbourne routes through our customs-controlled holding bay at the depot, where the container is loaded after a final inventory check.
Every Eastbourne quote starts with an in-home or video survey — free, no obligation, and the only way to give you a fixed price that doesn’t move on move day. The surveyor walks every room, photographs access at both ends, and counts the cartons by size. The written quote follows within 48 hours, broken down by line: crew time, lorry, fuel, pad-wrap, materials, insurance, any specialist handling. You can see exactly what every cost line is paying for.
Confirming the date takes a 20-25% deposit, protected under the BAR Advance Payment Guarantee. The balance is paid on the day of completion. The crew that arrives on move day is the crew that gets the job done from start to finish — uniformed, directly employed, trained at our Sussex training centre. No agency labour, no day rates, no sub-contractors. It’s a slightly more expensive way to run a removals firm but it’s the single biggest reason we’ve been in business since 1982.
Our hourly rate starts from £55 per hour for one mover plus driver, with a 2-hour minimum. A weekend or evening surcharge applies. Larger vans and additional movers are quoted separately.
Sometimes — it depends on our diary. We do not promise same-day in advance; call us and we will tell you honestly what we can fit in today.
Man-and-van is hourly, uses a smaller vehicle (Luton or 3.5-tonne), suits small flats, single items and student moves. A full removal is quoted as a fixed job, uses larger lorries and includes our full pad-wrap protection and packing service.
Yes — we can drop materials in advance or you can collect from our Lower Dicker depot. Pad-wrap and blankets are included with the vehicle.
Absolutely — IKEA flat-pack collections, eBay pickups and Facebook Marketplace runs are some of our most common man-and-van jobs. Tell us the address and dimensions and we will quote.
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What to check before you sign — BAR membership, insurance, written quotes, reviews. Plus the red flags that mean "walk away".
Read article →Call us today for a free, no-obligation quote — or use our online form. Whether it's a one-room move or a full international relocation, we've handled it before.