Facebook Marketplace & eBay Delivery

How a Marketplace collection actually works

Four things happen, and only the first one needs you.

• You send the listing. The link or a screenshot is ideal, because it usually already carries the dimensions, the postcode and the seller's collection window. Add your delivery postcode and anything we should know about stairs at your end.
• You settle up with the seller. Agree payment with the seller yourself — bank transfer, PayPal, whatever the two of you have agreed — and we collect once it is paid. We carry goods, not money. If the seller wants payment on collection, pay them by transfer while we are on the doorstep and they can watch it land.
• We arrange the window. Give us the seller's number and we sort the time out with them directly. You do not have to be at the collection end, relay messages or take an afternoon off.
• We collect, wrap and deliver. Blankets and straps for the journey, and it comes into the room you want it in — not left on the pavement outside your building.

Most London collections happen the same day, seven days a week between 7am and 10pm — usually within about two hours of booking where the diary has a slot, and there is nothing to add for that: a dedicated same-day run is the service, not an upgrade on it. The single most useful thing you can send us is a photo of the item next to something of known size, and a photo of the doorway it has to come through at your end.

Local, across London, or across the country

Distance is what moves the price, not the platform. The same three bands apply whether it came from Marketplace, eBay, Gumtree, Vinted or a shop.

• Local, £45. Seller and buyer reasonably close, item small enough for one person to handle — a chair, a mirror, a bike, a boxed item, a bedside table. This is the classic Marketplace price.
• Larger single item within the M25, £55. Anything that genuinely needs the van rather than a car boot: sofas, wardrobes, beds, dining sets, appliances. Across London counts — Enfield to Croydon is still one job.
• Outside the M25, £1.90 a loaded mile with a £95 minimum. The minimum covers the first 50 loaded miles, so the bargain sitting in Oxford, Reading, Milton Keynes or anywhere in Bucks, Herts, Berks or Surrey is on or near it. Past that it is simply the mileage: 60 miles is £114. Worth doing the sum before you bid — add the collection to the asking price and see whether it is still the bargain it looked like.
• Anywhere else on the UK mainland, the same rate. One item, one dedicated van, nothing else on board: 200 miles is £380. Loaded miles means collection to delivery — the empty run home is inside the rate and there is no fuel surcharge. See long distance for how that ladder works.

A second person is £45 where the item needs two — corner sofas, American fridges, anything going up more than two flights without a lift. It is far cheaper booked than discovered, because a job that has to be abandoned on the doorstep still used up the slot.

What sellers need to know

Half of these jobs involve a seller who has never sent anything by courier and is quietly worried that this is a scam. It is worth telling them three things when you book, because it makes the collection go smoothly.

• Who is coming and when. We will ring them to agree a window, and we will ring again when we are close. Give them the buyer's name so they know which sale it relates to.
• Money is not our business. The driver will not hand over cash and will not collect a payment on your behalf. Sellers should be paid before or at the point of collection, directly by the buyer. It protects both sides.
• What the driver will and will not do. We will carry the item out, including down stairs, and we bring trolleys, straps and blankets. We will not dismantle a bed frame or unplumb a washing machine unless it has been agreed in advance — those want tools and time, and they change the slot.

Sellers who want to shift something bulky in a hurry sometimes book this themselves, which is fine: we will collect from you and deliver to your buyer on exactly the same ladder. And if the buyer pulls out after you have paid us, tell us early — a slot we can refill costs nobody anything.

Van loads and multi-seller runs

If you have had a good week on Marketplace, doing it one item at a time is the expensive way. A van load is £195 and covers several items, several sellers, or a house lot in one run.

The usual cases: furnishing a flat from scratch from four different listings around north London; a landlord kitting out a let; a house clearance buy where somebody has sold the whole contents of a room; an office picking up desks and chairs from two or three sellers. Three separate £55 collections and a van load are close in price, and the van load is one afternoon instead of three appointments — so as soon as the list gets to three bulky things, ask us to price it as a load.

Two practical limits. First, the sellers have to be reachable in one sensible route on one day: four addresses spread across Watford, Bromley, Ealing and Romford is two jobs, not one. Second, the pile has to fit — a van load means a Luton's worth, not a three-bed house. Send us the list of items with rough dimensions and we will tell you honestly whether it is one load or two before you commit to anything.

For a genuine flat's worth of furniture, small removals or an hourly man and van booking at £89 an hour with two movers, 2-hour minimum, may work out better. We will say which one is cheaper for your job rather than defaulting to the dearer one.

IKEA, warehouses and store click-and-collect

The same service works on shops, and it is often the reason people find this page. Store collection is £55.

• IKEA. Wembley, Croydon, Greenwich, Lakeside and Reading are all regular runs. Order for click-and-collect, send us the order number and the collection slot, and we bring it to your door. See IKEA delivery for the detail.
• Furniture showrooms and clearance warehouses. Plenty will hold an item but will not deliver it, or will only deliver in three weeks on a day they choose.
• Kerbside deliveries you have already paid for. Where the retailer will only drop to the pavement, we can be there to take it up the stairs and into the room.
• Auction houses and eBay business sellers. Usually a fixed collection window and a strict cut-off, which suits a dedicated van better than a courier network.

Flat-pack from a store travels well; assembled furniture from a private seller does not always. If the wardrobe is already built and the doorway is 76cm, the honest answer may be that it needs dismantling first. Send photos and we will say so before you buy, which is a better outcome than a refund argument afterwards.

The checks worth doing before you buy

Almost every Marketplace collection that goes wrong goes wrong for the same three reasons. Five minutes of questions to the seller prevents all of them.

• Measure it, and measure your doorway. Length, depth and height in centimetres. "Large sofa" tells us nothing; 218 x 92 x 85 tells us everything, including whether it will turn on your stairs.
• Ask about the seller's access. Second floor, no lift, narrow Victorian staircase, permit-only parking — all fine, all need knowing. That is what decides whether it is a one-person or a £45 two-person job.
• Ask for photos of the actual item, today. Not the manufacturer's stock photo. Photograph the corners, the underside and any damage. It is your evidence about the condition it was in when we collected it.
• Check what is included. Bed slats, sofa feet, appliance hoses, glass shelves and the allen key all go missing between listing and collection. Agree it in writing on the platform.
• Check appliances are disconnected and drained. A washing machine that has not been drained will leak on the way, and the transit bolts matter more than people think.
• Do the total sum. Item plus collection is the real price. A cheap chest of drawers round the corner plus £45 is usually still a good buy; the same chest 60 miles away plus £114 often is not.

Send photos on WhatsApp and we will tell you straight whether it fits, whether it needs two people and what the price is, before you commit.