Tipping and Treats for movers?

[lost*in*cyberspace]

Call and find out what you are ALLOWED to do - one of our moving companies that we used with the military wouldn't allow them to accept anyting - it was terms for termination - even taking a bottle of water

That is really odd. My husband was active duty army for 30 years and we made many moves and I was never told this. How in the world would they know if you tipped?

Always have water available and always tip. For such a small move, I would tip each guy $10-15.

 

[tvguy]

That is really odd. My husband was active duty army for 30 years and we made many moves and I was never told this. How in the world would they know if you tipped?

Always have water available and always tip. For such a small move, I would tip each guy $10-15.

My wife's nephew managed a Lowes Home Improvement store. Back before Lowes starting hiring independent contractors for delivery, the delivery staff on the payroll could be fired for accepting a tip. The mindset was the customer had already paid an extra fee for delivery....and that the employee's pay was high enough that a tip should not be expected.

 

[verleniahall]

That is really odd. My husband was active duty army for 30 years and we made many moves and I was never told this. How in the world would they know if you tipped?

Always have water available and always tip. For such a small move, I would tip each guy $10-15.

I had bittled water and fruit for them.

They had a supervusor to oversee rhe boxing and when i pointed it out he told me that it was grounds for termination if they accepted anything.

I put it in our truck for the following day

 

[AlexLap]

I'm glad that I've found this thread as I need to move to another place and wonder how other people tip movers. Thanks for sharing your experiences, guys. And any updates are aapreciated.

 

[jerrywilliams]

We moved 1,5 year ago and the amount of stuff we packed was enormous. We lived in an old house without elevators and very uncomfortable stairs. The guys from https://expomovers.com/ where walking up and down those stairs probably more than 100 times and they never complained. They where smily and friendly even at the end of this exhausting day, so i gave each $100 and couple of beers at the end of the move of course. They seemed to be happy with that.

 

[reddog21]

I asked movers to move something that wasn't part of the original move so I gave them a tip otherwise I don't tip.

 

[Miffy]

I think $20 or $25 in cash for each mover sounds about right for your move--and tip at the end, not the beginning. Bottled water would be good to have, too. This is hard work.

Food is up to you. Depending on the time the movers arrive and finish, the food could be either welcome or unnecessary and it might be impossible to know in advance.

So nice of you to plan for this. Enjoy your new home!

 

[nolatravelgirl]

I think you may be under estimating the time the move is going to take. A lot of furniture needs to assembled/disassembled. Furniture needs to be tied down and secured in the truck which also takes time. Are they going up stairs at either location? How far will the truck have to park? I have moved from a large complex and movers are often required to use a loading dock which could be a LONG way from your apartment.

 

[georgina]

(The OP is 4 years old!) I had '2 Men and a Truck' for our move from SW PA to No VA. They had 5 guys pack up our house, and 3 of them drove the truck to VA and spent the night at a hotel, unloading it the next day. It was a lot of work, we moved into a 4 story townhouse. I gave the 2 guys who were only there to pack up $50 each, and the 3 guys who packed up and unloaded the next day $150 each, plus bought them lunch at a sandwich place.

 

[_19disnA]

We have moved several times over the years and never provided them food. Water makes sense, particularly bottled water which is portable, doesn't spill since it has a cap and they can carry it with them or set it down while doing their work. When you first arrive at your new location, you likely wouldn't even have any food and they may not have yet hooked up the refrigerator. Experienced movers know how long they will be at your house either packing/loading/unloading the truck and they tend to bring their own snacks with them. None of the major companies we ever used mentioned anything about company rules about what you can/cannot provide. Food is more challenging since movers tend to work non-stop and aren't likely to stop for 30 minutes to eat a meal.

Our experience has been with boxing up items which tends to take the longest time, they will leave for lunch (for example) and then return to complete the packing.

Only if they do something over and above for you would I consider tipping. (For example, if the mover doesn't routinely hookup things like a washer/dryer but offers to help.) They are workers at the moving company and get paid by their employer. To me it isn't any different then hiring a maintenance person to fix something. I don't think they expect me to tip them for doing a job they were hired to do and are getting paid.

Certainly think tipping at the START of a move is a bad idea since you create this expectation of further tipping. The person who comes to your home to provide the original estimate should also factor into the costs how long things will take, if they need to bring heavy items up flights of stairs, etc. That is all part of what you are paying them to do as part of the move.

With most of our moves, there also seems to be one person during the actual move who is in charge and it could be awkward tipping some but not all of the workers. I just don't see that as an expectation for the typical move.

 

[snowwite]

I’ve never heard of tipping movers. We did it ourselves and paid friend with beer and pizza last time we moved.

 

[WDW_fan_in_TX]

Haven't been on this site in probably 2 months, and this is the first thread I stumble upon. It's a good one too, as we're thinking about moving. Well not thinking about it. We got new jobs in the DFW Metroplex, and we live about 3 hours east of there right now. So we're going to be hiring someone here to load a UHual as well as someone in Dallas to unload the Uhual. So glad I stumbled on this thread. Now to figure out who to call and when to make the move. Anyone help me with that? Just kidding of course. But we're currently boxing everything up and putting it into the garage. It's just a 1-story house, and we're moving into a 1-story house too.

 

[niclodn]

I've moved several times in the past 10 years. I always hire "moving helpers" from the Uhaul website (usually choose based on reviews). Most of my moves have been local and took about 4 hours - load at one place, drive to another place and unload. I always have cold water available and tip about $50-60 total (usually 2-3 guys, so $20 each). One time, I moved from a 2nd floor apartment to a 3rd floor apartment in a different building in the same complex - that time I also ordered pizza for them cuz it was A LOT of stairs and they never even sat down to rest once!

 

[Threehearts]

We've moved 9 times, 3 internationally so I won't count those. Several were corporate moves, so we didn't pay for those transfers.

We are in a metropolitan area and the move down the street from a 3 bedroom house to the same was $8,000. They moved everything but didn't pack dishes, valuables and that type of thing. We bought lunch for the 4 men, had a cooler with ice and waters, tipped each $100 and had cold beers when they finished. I would say that we were somewhat generous but totally in keeping with the area we live in. My son worked as a mover on and off when he was in college. He never made more than minimum wage.

You can easily look up the hiring wages for these companies if you would like to check out the company you are engaging for your move.

 

[Disney316]

I may be late to respond but when I moved last year I looked up the movers helpers on UHaul but then contacted the company directly (not through UHaul) and it was a much better price because they didn’t have to pay UHaul a fee.

The move was quoted at an hourly rate and they finished quicker than originally estimated so I tipped an extra hour’s rate (about $50 each)

 

[mjkacmom]

I’ve never heard of tipping movers. We did it ourselves and paid friend with beer and pizza last time we moved.

I’ve never heard of not tipping movers, I think you are in the minority.

 

[georgina]

I’ve never heard of not tipping movers, I think you are in the minority.

Growing up with not much money, I had never heard of tipping service people either other than food servers. I stayed in a hotel exactly once with my family between the time I was born and started going on interview trips senior year of college. I didn't know about tipping housekeeping, I didn't know about tipping hair stylists, etc until I was older. I was assisting my mother-in-law many years ago when she was moving apartments a few miles apart, looking back I think the movers were looking at me for a tip but I had no idea.