UK → France
Removals from the UK to France
The nearest of the four routes and the one we run most. Short crossing, good roads at the other end, and a process that is predictable once the paperwork is in hand.
Two different moves wear the same label
Almost everything we take to France falls into one of two categories, and they want completely different things from us.
The working move is a job in Paris or Lyon, a flat at the other end, a firm start date, and a household that needs to arrive intact and on schedule. Tight, date-driven, and the delivery access is urban.
The property move is somewhere in the Lot, the Gers, the Dordogne or the Charente — a house bought over a couple of years and now being furnished properly. Relaxed about dates, difficult about access, and frequently attached to a renovation that has not finished.
We plan them differently, and it is worth telling us which yours is on the first call.
The crossing, and then the long bit
Wherever in the UK you are, the route funnels to the same place: round to the M20 and down to Folkestone for the shuttle. France is mostly the drive rather than the crossing.
From Coquelles the roads fan out. The A26 heads south towards Reims for Paris, Burgundy and the east. The A16 runs down the coast for Normandy, picking up the A28 and A11 for Brittany, the Loire and the whole western side. The south-west is the A10 corridor past Tours, Poitiers and Bordeaux, then east into the Dordogne. Provence and the Côte d'Azur mean the A6 and A7 down through Lyon, which is the long one and is planned around driver rest periods rather than wishful thinking.
The ferry exception is worth knowing about. Portsmouth to Caen or Cherbourg, or Poole to St Malo, lands the vehicle close to a great many properties that would otherwise be most of a day's drive from Calais.
The French paperwork, in the order it matters
- The inventory. Bilingual or in French, itemised, and valued realistically. This is the document customs reconciles against the vehicle, so it has to be right.
- Evidence of transfer of residence. A certificat de changement de résidence, or whatever equivalent your consulate directs you to. This is the piece that takes longest.
- Proof of the French address. A bail for a rental; an acte de vente or a notaire's attestation for a purchase.
- Transit documentation. Ours to raise, lodged before the vehicle leaves the UK.
We prepare and lodge the export side. What only you can obtain — anything requiring your signature, your residency application, your address proof — is what to start on first. Nobody has ever regretted starting the French consular process too early.
Delivering at the other end
Paris is a city delivery with city problems, and they are recognisable if you have ever moved in central London. Narrow streets in the older arrondissements. Courtyards reached through an archway a large vehicle will not pass. Buildings with a staircase that makes a Victorian conversion look generous. We plan it the same way we plan a difficult UK block: establish the access, then size the vehicle and crew to it.
Rural France is the opposite problem. The property is easy once you are there; getting there is the issue. Tracks, low branches, a bridge with a weight limit, a courtyard entrance built for a horse and cart. Send photographs of the approach at survey and we will decide then whether the last leg needs something smaller.
Renovations and the case for waiting
A good number of French property moves are attached to a house that is still being worked on. Delivering furniture into an active building site is how good furniture gets ruined — dust, unfinished floors, no lockable door, trades in and out all day.
If the house is not genuinely finished, holding the load in sealed storage here is almost always the better answer. The containers wait, you pick a date that works, and the furniture arrives into a house rather than a project.
Timing
We will not put a transit figure on a web page. It depends on whether your load is dedicated or shared, on the destination region, and on how clearance runs. Your written quote sets out an expected window for your specific move and tells you plainly what would shift it — a shared load waiting to fill, a documentation query, an address that needs a transfer.
Comparing routes? Spain and Portugal share most of the first half of this drive, and the overview explains how dedicated and shared loads differ.
Good to know
UK to France, the practical questions
Tunnel or ferry?
Eurotunnel for most moves — quicker, less weather-dependent, and a straightforward booking for a removals vehicle. The Portsmouth and Poole ferries into Caen, Cherbourg and St Malo earn their place for Normandy and Brittany specifically, because the driving saved at the other end more than pays for the longer crossing.
What paperwork does France want?
A detailed inventory, in French or bilingual, valued line by line. Evidence of transfer of residence — normally a certificat de changement de résidence or the equivalent your consulate directs you to. And proof of your French address: a bail for a rental, an acte de vente or a notaire's attestation for a purchase. Those three together are what allow used personal effects in without import duty.
We are furnishing a second home rather than moving. Does that matter?
Substantially. Transfer-of-residence relief applies when France becomes your primary residence. Furnishing a holiday house while staying UK-resident is a conventional import, with duty and VAT assessed on declared value. It is a perfectly normal thing to do — it just has to be declared as what it is, and it changes how the inventory is valued.
Can you deliver to a rural property down a track?
Usually, but tell us at survey. A great many south-west French houses sit at the end of an approach a full-size vehicle cannot use. The answer is a smaller vehicle for the final leg or a transfer, and both want planning rather than discovering on arrival. Photographs of the approach are genuinely useful.
Will you take wine?
A personal cellar moving as part of a household is treated differently from a commercial consignment, and there are quantity thresholds involved. It is possible, it needs declaring properly, and it needs raising at survey rather than being found in the garage on loading day.
What about the car?
A vehicle has its own French import process — registration, a quitus fiscal, a contrôle technique if it is staying. That is entirely separate from the household goods declaration. We can sometimes carry one depending on route and vehicle, but the paperwork is yours and it wants starting early.
Do you collect from more than one UK address?
Regularly. Households leaving for France are often spread across a house, a storage unit and a relative's garage. Build the collections into the plan at survey — adding one after the vehicle is loaded is a different job.
Moving to France? Tell us where and we'll map the route.
Region, rough timing, and whether it is a full relocation or a house being furnished. Those three shape everything else.