Planning an office move in Toronto starts with the lease date and works backwards. Name one person to run it, take an inventory, turn the new floor plan into labelled destination zones, agree an IT plan with your own IT team, and get the move rules from both buildings in writing. Book a commercial mover early, and ask how much notice they need for an office of your size.
This guide sets out the order of the work, what each step involves, and where office moves most often go wrong. It is written for office managers, operations leads and facilities teams who have been handed a move on top of their usual job.
Start with the dates you cannot move
Every office move has two fixed points: the day you must leave the old space and the day the team needs to work in the new one. Everything else is arranged between them.
Confirm both in writing with your landlord or broker. Ask when you can get access to the new space, whether the fit-out will be finished by then, and whether you can bring anything in early. Ask too when the old space must be empty, and in what condition. A lease that ends on a Friday with a new space that is still being painted is a common problem, and much easier to solve with three months’ notice than three days’.
Name one person to run it
An office move needs a single internal lead: one person who makes decisions, holds the plan and speaks to the mover, the buildings and IT. In a small firm this is often the office manager. In a larger one it may be facilities with a small committee of department representatives.
The lead does not have to do the work. They have to know where everything stands, and be the person everyone else asks.
Take an inventory
Walk the office and list what is moving: workstations, chairs, storage, meeting room furniture, kitchen equipment, files, IT equipment, art, plants and anything heavy or awkward, such as a safe or a large printer. Note what is staying behind, what belongs to the landlord, and what is being replaced.
This list becomes the basis of every quote and every plan, so it is worth doing properly. A mover can only price and plan what they know about.
Turn the floor plan into zones
The new floor plan is the most useful document in the move. Divide it into destination zones: a department, a row of desks, a meeting room, the kitchen. Give each zone a number or a colour, and give each desk or office a code within it.
Then label everything in the old office to match. Every box, chair, monitor and pedestal carries the code of the place it is going. On the day, the crew loads in sequence and places each item straight into its zone, rather than unloading into a pile and sorting it afterwards. Ask your mover whether they can work from your floor plan and zone map.
Post a copy of the zone map at the entrance of each floor in the new space, and give one to the crew lead.
Agree the IT plan early
Computers, monitors, phones and servers can be packed and moved by a commercial mover. Disconnecting them, setting them up again and bringing systems back online is usually work for your own IT team or provider. Ask your mover where their work stops and your IT team’s begins, and get the answer in writing.
Agree three things with IT well before the day: when systems go down, who disconnects and labels equipment, and who reconnects and tests it at the new office. Confirm that internet and phone service will be live in the new space before the move, not after. Servers and network equipment deserve their own conversation, and often their own time slot.
Get both buildings’ rules in writing
Commercial buildings have move rules, and they are rarely the same at both ends. Ask each property manager for:
- Freight elevator bookings. Which elevator, for how long, and how far ahead it must be reserved.
- Loading dock access. Truck size limits, booking windows and where vehicles can wait.
- Certificate of insurance. Many buildings require the mover’s certificate before the day, often naming the landlord and property manager. Send the requirements to your mover early.
- Permitted hours. Many office buildings require moves to happen in the evening or at the weekend so tenants are not disrupted.
- Protection and security. Floor and wall protection rules, and whether building security must be present.
Yugo can provide a certificate of insurance to buildings and property managers on request. Send us each building’s requirements when you book (Yugo).
Purge before you pack
A move is the best chance an office will get to throw things away. Set a date by which each team must clear its desks, cabinets and storage rooms. Arrange recycling, donation and disposal for furniture and equipment that is not coming.
Old computers, drives and paper records need particular care. Guidance from the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada, summarized by the law firm Bennett Jones, is that personal information must be securely destroyed or removed before hardware is disposed of, and that an organization remains responsible for that information even when a contractor does the work (Bennett Jones). For electronics that are being recycled rather than destroyed, Ontario’s Where to Recycle map lists free drop-off locations (RPRA). Check with the site that it accepts business quantities.
Records that need chain of custody or restricted access should be identified at the planning stage, so they can be handled separately (Yugo).
Tell your people, and tell them twice
Staff need to know the date, what they are expected to pack, how to label it, what to take home on the last day, and where they will sit. Send one clear note early and a short reminder the week of the move. Include the zone map, the new address, building access instructions and who to ask if something is missing on Monday.
Ask each person to pack their own desk and personal items, and to keep anything valuable or confidential with them.
A working timeline
Every move is different, but this order holds for most offices.
- As soon as the lease is signed. Confirm the exit date and the new access date. Name the internal lead. Ask both buildings for their move rules.
- Two to three months before. Take the inventory. Agree the IT plan. Ask commercial movers to assess both sites and quote.
- Six to eight weeks before. Choose the mover. Finalize the floor plan and destination zones. Decide what is being disposed of, and book disposal.
- Four to six weeks before. Book the freight elevators and loading docks. Send the certificate of insurance requirements to the mover. For a larger, multi-floor office, confirm the booking by now.
- Two to three weeks before. Confirm the mover’s booking if you have not already. Tell staff the plan. Deliver packing materials and labels.
- The final week. Staff pack. IT confirms the shutdown time. The lead walks the new space with the floor plan.
- Move day. Crew loads in sequence and places to the zone map. IT reconnects.
- Before Monday. Walk the new space with the crew lead, note anything outstanding, and sign off.
- The first Monday. Someone is on hand with a list of known issues and a way to report new ones.
Lead times vary by mover, so ask each one how much notice they need for an office of your size, and build the timeline around their answer.
The walkthrough
Before the crew leaves, the internal lead walks the new office with the crew lead. Is each zone complete? Are workstations assembled and level? Is anything damaged, missing or in the wrong place? Anything outstanding is noted and agreed before sign-off. Every Yugo move is planned in advance, tracked in real time on the day, and signed off with you at the end.
Where office moves go wrong
Many problems trace back to one of four things: a building rule nobody asked about, an IT plan that was assumed rather than agreed, labels that do not match the floor plan, or a team that did not finish packing. Each is easy to prevent with a few weeks’ notice and very hard to fix on the night.
If you are planning an office move in Toronto, talk to our commercial team or read how our office relocations work.
Sources
Office relocation, Yugo
Regulatory Obligations Concerning the Disposal of Outdated Hard Drives and Servers, Bennett Jones
