Getting ready for the van

Most deliveries that go badly were decided days earlier, by something nobody thought to do. The sofa fits, the crew turn up, and then twenty minutes go on moving a bookcase, finding somebody to take the old sofa, or working out that the thing was supposed to go upstairs.

None of that is dramatic and all of it is avoidable. This is what to do, roughly in the order it needs doing.

Decide the extras at checkout, not on the day

This is the one that actually costs people, so it goes first. Upstairs delivery, assembly and taking your old sofa away are chosen when you order. They are not services the crew can add at your front door — the visit is planned around what was booked, and a two-person team scheduled for a ground-floor drop is not carrying a corner sofa to a second floor because you asked nicely on the day.

• Upstairs — £20 for the first floor, or for any floor if there is a lift; £10 for each further floor without one.
• Assembly in the room — £20.
• Old sofa taken away — £30, indicative. A very large item can cost more and we confirm that with you once the order reaches us, not on the doorstep.

If you have already ordered and realise you need one of these, ring rather than wait — 07476 616022 — and we will sort it before the van is loaded.

Confirm the day, and protect it

Most UK Mainland orders arrive in two to four working days; some Wales and Scotland postcodes take five to seven. Either way the day can come round quickly, which is the reason to have the rest of this list done before it does.

Once a slot has actually been confirmed with you, treat it as fixed. A missed confirmed slot means the whole trip has to be made again, and there is a £50 re-delivery charge for that. Before a date is confirmed, moving it costs nothing at all and you can change it as often as you need.

Clear the route the day before

Not the room. The route: the path from where the van will stop to where the sofa is going, all of it, including the bits you walk past without seeing.

• Shoes, bins, bikes and buggies out of the hall.
• Pictures and mirrors off the walls along the route — corners get caught.
• Coats off the hooks, and the hooks themselves if they stick out at shoulder height.
• Anything on the stairs, plus the loose runner or the rug at the bottom that slides underfoot.
• Doors wedged open, and internal doors lifted off their hinges if that is the plan.

Whether the pieces fit through the door is a separate question with its own calculator on the size guide — settle that before you order, not the night before. Worth knowing either way: a sofa arrives in pieces and the feet unscrew, which takes around 10cm off the height and gets a great many of them through a doorway they would not clear assembled.

Know exactly where it is going

Decide the precise position before delivery day, not while two people are holding one end of a corner unit in your hallway.

Standard delivery brings the sofa to the ground floor, or to a ground-floor room of your choice — so choose the room, and clear the spot in it. Move the old furniture out first, vacuum the floor while you can still reach it, and check the sofa will not end up within 30cm of a radiator, which dries leather and can warp a wooden frame over a winter. That one is in the care guide and it is much easier to honour before the sofa is in place than after.

If it is a corner or a U-shape, tape the footprint out. There is a whole article on why an L eats more floor than people expect.

Deal with the old sofa first

The old one has to be gone, or at least out of the room, before the new one comes in. Two sofas do not pass each other in a hallway.

If you booked removal at checkout, just have it accessible and stripped of anything you want to keep — people lose remote controls, phone chargers and, twice that we know of, a set of car keys down the back of a sofa they were watching drive away.

If you did not book removal, sort it out this week rather than on the day. Your council will collect bulky waste, usually for a small fee and usually with a wait of a week or two, which is exactly why this is not a Friday afternoon job. Charities will often take a sofa in good condition if it still has its fire-safety label — no label, no collection, and that catches people out constantly.

Parking, and how the van gets there

The van has to reach the property and the crew have to unload safely. The usual obstacles are narrow lanes, low archways, permit-only bays, a blocked driveway, a skip outside, or a gate that is narrower than the gap it appears to be.

If any of those apply, tell us when you order so it can be planned around rather than discovered. If you can keep a space clear outside on the morning, do — a crew carrying a three-seater forty metres from a side street is slower and more likely to catch something on the way.

Flats: check whether the lift is big enough and whether it needs booking, because many buildings require notice for a furniture move and some will not allow one at certain hours.

Protect the house, and the rest of the household

• Floors. Old sheets, cardboard or a runner along the route. Wet weather and a heavy load is how hallway carpet gets marked.
• Door frames and corners. The narrow pinch points are where the damage happens. A folded towel taped over an exposed corner costs nothing.
• Pets. Shut them in a room that is not on the route, with the door closed. Front doors stand open for a long time on a delivery and this is when animals get out.
• Small children. Same, for the same reason plus the obvious one about heavy objects moving through a hallway.

On the day itself

Somebody over 18 needs to be there who can look at the sofa and pay for it. If that will not be you, make sure whoever it is knows the total and is comfortable deciding whether the condition is acceptable — because that decision is the whole point of paying on the doorstep.

Have the payment ready: cash, or a bank transfer from your phone while the driver is there. No cards. Get the wrapping off and look at the piece properly before any money changes hands. That side of the day is set out in cash on delivery, explained, and it only works if you actually look.

After the van leaves

You will be left with a surprising volume of plastic wrap, cardboard and foam. Most of the film is not kerbside recyclable in most councils, so check yours before it all goes in the blue bin.

Keep the feet and fixings somewhere sensible even if the sofa is assembled — they are what you will want if it ever moves house. And leave the cushions to settle for a few days before deciding the sofa is firmer than you expected; new foam and new fibre both give a little over the first week or two of being sat on.

If something is not right, you have 24 hours to email us with photographs, and the delivery and returns page sets out exactly what happens next.