The worry with an office move is rarely the furniture. It’s the hours your business isn’t running while it happens.

The good news is that downtime is almost entirely a planning problem — and planning is the part you can control. Here’s a realistic timeline that keeps a business trading.

Eight weeks out: get the measure of it

Start with the two things everything else depends on.

Book a survey. A proper walk-round of both sites gives you an accurate quote and, more importantly, flags the problems early — a goods lift that’s out of action, a loading bay you need permission to use, a stairwell your server cabinet won’t fit through.

Confirm your date. Then work backwards from it. Most businesses move on a Friday evening or over a weekend, so the team leaves one office and arrives at a working one on Monday. That single decision removes most of the downtime worry.

Six weeks out: sort the things with lead times

These are the items that bite if you leave them:

• Broadband and phone lines at the new site. This is the number one cause of a business arriving and not being able to work. Connections can take weeks. Order early.
• Access and parking permissions at both buildings.
• A floor plan for the new space — who sits where, and where the printers and meeting rooms go.
• Tell your landlord, and check what condition you need to leave the old space in.

Four weeks out: tell people

Customers, suppliers, your bank, your insurer, and everyone who sends you post. There’s a full checklist for this in our guide to who to notify — it’s longer than most people expect.

Two weeks out: label everything

This is where a smooth move is actually won.

Give every desk, cupboard and box a destination label — the room or desk number it’s going to, not where it came from. Colour-coding by department works brilliantly.

It sounds fussy. It’s the difference between a team unpacking in twenty minutes and a team hunting for the finance files at 9am Monday.

One week out: the IT plan

IT is the part that decides whether Monday works.

• Agree who’s disconnecting and reconnecting — your IT provider, or the movers
• Back everything up before anything is unplugged
• Photograph the back of your server and network cabinet before disconnecting. It’s the fastest reassembly guide you’ll ever have
• Bag and label cables by machine

Moving day: keep it boring

The aim is a move where nothing memorable happens.

Have one person on site at each end as the point of contact. Keep a small “day one” box — kettle, mugs, chargers, loo roll, the essentials. And let the crew get on with the lifting.

Day one at the new site

Check the internet, the phones and the printers before anything else. Sort any snags while someone’s still around to fix them. Then unpack the desks people actually need first, and leave the storage cupboards for later in the week.

That’s it. Not simple exactly — but entirely manageable, if it starts eight weeks out rather than eight days.

FAQ

How long does an office move take? The physical move for a small office is often a single evening or weekend. The planning around it typically takes six to eight weeks, which is where the real work sits.

How do I avoid business downtime during a move? Move out of hours or over a weekend, order broadband and phone lines at the new site early, and agree the IT disconnection and reconnection plan in advance.

When should I start planning an office relocation? Around eight weeks ahead for most small and medium offices. Larger relocations need longer, mainly because of IT and connectivity lead times.