Man with a van, Wellington hills and all

A man with a van job in Wellington is one load rather than a whole house. A sofa going from a Newtown villa to a flat in Berhampore. A bed and a desk shifting between student flats in Aro Valley and Kelburn when a tenancy ends. A Trade Me pickup out in Petone that was never going to fit in a hatchback. Flat-pack from a retailer up in Porirua, timber and sheets of ply from a hardware store for a deck in Miramar, or a studio shift where the whole lot goes in a single van run.

Suburbs here sit close together and still take a while to reach. Ngaio Gorge Road, Wadestown Road and the climb over Brooklyn are narrow and winding, and the eastern suburbs sit past Evans Bay or through the Mount Victoria Tunnel. Plenty of hill houses meet the street with a flight of steps and nowhere to stop a van. Coupon and residents' parking covers much of Te Aro, Mount Victoria and Thorndon. If the pickup is an apartment in the central city, check whether the service lift needs booking ahead. A southerly across an exposed driveway in Island Bay turns a mattress into a two-person carry.

Because drivers set their own prices, a Wellington job gets priced on what it actually involves. A driver already heading down the Ngauranga Gorge to the Hutt, or coming back into town after a Kapiti Coast drop, weighs your job differently from one starting the day in Tawa. Steps, a coupon zone and whether a wardrobe needs two people are what move the number, which is why two bids on the same load can look quite different. A van and one driver costs less to run than a truck and a crew, which is another reason bids on the same load differ.