Eleven calls before lunch, all asking the same thing
Move day is the most anxious day of the customer's year. They are waiting for the solicitor to confirm completion, the estate agent to release keys, and the lorry to arrive at the new address. Every one of those is a phone call, and yours is the number they have.
The office rings the crew leader, who is carrying a wardrobe down the stairs and does not answer. The office rings again. Eventually an estimate is passed back to the customer, who rings again an hour later when it has passed.
Why the phone never stops
The customer calls because they have no other way of knowing. The office cannot answer without calling the crew, and the crew is doing the job.
- Nobody tells the customer when loading finishes and the lorry leaves.
- Arrival estimates are guessed by the crew leader mid-lift.
- Delays, such as waiting for keys, are not shared with everyone affected.
- On a multi-drop day, the second customer has no idea how the first job is going.
What the calls cost
Office time is spent relaying messages instead of preparing tomorrow. Crews are interrupted. And the customer's experience of your firm is shaped by being kept in the dark on the day that matters most, which is what they remember when they write a review.
How we send updates without anyone making a call
- The crew leader's job sheet has simple stage buttons: arrived, loading, loaded and leaving, arrived at the new address, finished.
- Each tap sends the customer a short text in your wording, through a service such as Twilio.
- When the lorry leaves, an arrival estimate is calculated from its tracker position and the route, and updated if traffic changes it.
- If you use vehicle tracking, an optional live link shows the customer the lorry on a map for that journey only.
- Delays, such as waiting for key release, can be sent with one tap from a list of common reasons.
- The office sees every job's stage on one screen, so the rare call that still comes in is answered straight away.
| Stage | What the customer receives |
|---|---|
| Crew arrived | Confirmation that the crew is on site |
| Loaded and leaving | Departure and an estimated arrival time |
| Running late | Reason and a revised estimate |
| Finished | Thank-you and a link to the completed job sheet |
Where a customer has no mobile, updates can go by email or to a named family member instead.
What move day sounds like in the office
Quieter. The customer knows the lorry has left and roughly when it will arrive. The office can see which jobs are running behind and ring ahead of the customer rather than after them. Crew leaders get on with the lifting.
The same stage records help afterwards. If a customer later says the crew arrived two hours late, the office can see exactly when each stage was tapped, which settles most disagreements quickly and fairly, whichever way the facts point.
Is move day loud in your office?
- Customers ring several times on the day of the move.
- The office has to call crews to find out where they are.
- Delays are passed on late or not at all.
- Arrival times are estimates from a busy crew leader.
- You have tracking on the lorries but customers never see it.