Apartment access: lifts, permits and building rules

If either end of your move is an apartment, there are four things to sort before moving day. Every one of them can stop the job dead, and all four are easy if you start six weeks out.

1. Book the service lift

Most Sydney buildings require the service lift to be booked in a block — commonly two or three hours — and padded with protective blankets before use. Some buildings only allow moves on weekdays, some only outside business hours, and some not at all on weekends. Ask building management or the strata manager for the move-in procedure in writing.

A two-hour lift booking is usually enough for a one or two-bedroom apartment, provided the crew is staged and ready when it starts. It is not enough if the truck arrives at the start of the window and has to be unloaded first.

2. Get the certificate of currency to them early

A certificate of currency is written proof that your removalist holds current public liability insurance. Most apartment buildings and effectively all commercial buildings require it before a removalist is allowed on site, and they want it days in advance, not on the morning.

If a removalist can't produce one, that tells you something important about the company, and it has nothing to do with paperwork.

3. Check the loading dock height

Underground and undercover loading docks have a fixed clearance, often somewhere between 2.5 and 3.5 metres. A full-size removal truck will not fit under many of them. Find out the clearance and tell your removalist, so they bring a truck that fits or plan to shuttle from the street.

Turning up with a truck too tall for the dock is one of the few moving-day problems with no good fix left.

4. Sort the parking

If there's no dock, the truck parks on the street, and in much of Sydney that means a resident parking scheme, a clearway, a loading zone with a time limit, or a bus lane. Councils issue temporary parking permits for removals — the process and cost vary by council, so check with the one covering your address.

It's worth the trouble. The alternative is a sixty-metre carry, which on an hourly job costs far more than any permit, or a parking fine on top of the move.

A few things that make the day faster

• Book the first lift slot of the day. Nothing has run late yet.
• Get your security fobs, keys and lift access sorted before the day, not at the concierge desk with a truck waiting.
• Measure the lift's internal dimensions if you own anything large. A three-seater that fits through a door may not fit in a lift.
• Ask whether a bond or deposit is required for lift damage. Some buildings hold one and refund it after inspection.
• Check whether there's an event on nearby. Around Olympic Park in particular, a stadium event changes the roads entirely.

Ask your removalist to deal with building management directly. We do it as a matter of course — it's ten minutes for us and a fortnight of chasing for you.