Experian credit Xpress for a Successful Move

All our office relocations hinge on having a close, collaborative working relationship with our customers. This helps us produce a thorough plan that will ensure the move is well communicated and as straight-forward as possible for everyone involved. We know this method works but it’s always great to hear our customer’s appreciation of it, especially when they keep in touch after the project. Continued contact like this not only allows us to provide ongoing support but we also value hearing about the longer-term impacts; particularly when we hear success stories like Experian’s experience of stronger internal staff relationships and a newfound pride in staff maintaining a clean office environment since their office relocation.

Moving Experian’s office was no small feat. It was a project to relocate 780+ staff and their belongings to new premises within a 3 month deadline.

The major requirement was that staff working hours were not disrupted, which, coupled with the size of the project and fact that different staff had individual move requirements, meant that it had to be broken down into phases.

Facilitated by Project Managers, Steve Mills from Xpress Relocation and Alan Begg from Experian, the project was conducted between Xpress and a dedicated Office Move Project Team at Experian to have the relocation executed on weekends so as not to disrupt normal staff operations. This meant that planning had to be done in the week between each move and that the 14 on-site staff from Xpress Relocation would start work at 5pm on a Friday (when Experian staff finished their working day) and finish on Sunday.

Planning started as soon as the job brief was finalised on 8 June in order to meet the 17 August completion deadline. Phase one began the next weekend (13/14 June) to construct desks into a “swing area” for staff to be temporarily located. Thereafter, every weekend was used for another office move right up to 15/16 August when the old premises were completely cleared for the new tenant.

Over the course of the 10 week project, equating to 10 weekends of relocating almost 800 staff, the Xpress team worked with a number of stakeholders to get the job done. Not only did the project require numerous vehicles but it also involved a number of collaborators; including building contractors (Ashlar) who were responsible for constructing new meeting rooms and installing all the cabling floor boxes.

Whilst some Experian staff had desks, chairs and IT equipment to be moved to the new premises, others needed relocating to new desks that were being constructed for them. These differences didn’t just call for thorough planning, but also meant that 8 trips were made by 7.5 tonne lorry loads carrying surplus equipment for recycling.

This project was an enormous endeavour, requiring a lot of hard work, collaboration and careful planning to make it the success it proved to be. The Xpress team is very proud to have been part of the job, and delighted to have received several thank you messages like this extract from an email from Samantha Phillips, Senior Administrator in Global Product Development at Experian sent us; giving testimony to the professionalism of the whole team.