Removals to Cologne from the UK
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Transport and customs documentation for a one-bedroom part load from the UK to Cologne cost £1,860 – £2,517, and for a three-bedroom house £4,104 – £5,639. Packing, transit cover and stairs or parking at either end are priced on top, from your own answers. Transit is 3–7 days door to door via Eurotunnel then A16/E40 via Belgium and the Netherlands.
Cologne wants the kerb booked three weeks ahead, and the no-stopping signs standing four days — ninety-six hours — before the lorry arrives. The Rhine then narrows the choices: the Deutzer Brücke and the Mülheimer Brücke are both capped at three and a half tonnes, so a loaded vehicle crosses further out and a right-bank address is reached the long way.
- Transit
- 3–7 days
- Departures
- Weekly
- From Calais
- about 260 miles
- Free survey, then a fixed price
- Customs paperwork handled
- Transit cover priced on the value you declare
- Secure your date online with a 25% deposit
From quote to keys
How your quote and booking work
The price you see online is an estimate worked out from your own list. A free survey turns it into a fixed price, and a deposit holds your date. How the price is worked out
Start my Cologne quoteGet your estimate — about three minutes
Pick your home size or list what is moving item by item, and watch the vehicle fill as you go. Choose a shared load or a vehicle of your own, tell us about stairs and parking at both ends, and your price appears with every line shown. We ask for your name, email and phone number before we show it, and email you a copy.
Have a free survey, and the price is fixed
Pick a weekday slot online for a video call and walk us round your rooms, or send photos on WhatsApp; near our depots we can visit instead. It costs nothing and commits you to nothing. Once we have surveyed, we do not revise the price upward on moving day.
Secure your date with a 25% deposit
Before the survey or after it, whichever suits you — online, by card. The deposit holds the vehicle and the date. If the survey changes the price and you would rather not go ahead, you get the full deposit back. Otherwise our terms and conditions set out what we charge if you postpone or cancel.
Sort the paperwork in your own portal
You get a private page for your move: the customs checklist for Germany and somewhere to upload each document. If you listed your items one by one, that list is already there — add a rough value to each line and it becomes the valued inventory customs ask for.
Collection in the UK, delivery in Cologne
On a shared load you choose the collection day and we give you a delivery window, confirming the day itself once the vehicle has cleared customs. With a vehicle of your own, both dates are yours. The balance is due on the day we collect.
Part-load prices from the UK to Cologne
Cologne is priced in Zone 2 — Paris, Randstad, Rhineland. These are indicative part-load bands for the transport and the £180 customs documentation fee. Collection beyond 30 miles of our depots adds a mileage contribution, and packing, access and cover are priced from your own answers — each shows as its own line on your quote.
| Property size | Volume | UK to Cologne, part load | Quote |
|---|---|---|---|
| Studio | 8 m³283 ft³ | £1,152 – £1,532 | Price mine — studio to Cologne → |
| 1 bedroom | 16 m³565 ft³ | £1,860 – £2,517 | Price mine — 1 bedroom to Cologne → |
| 2 bedrooms | 28 m³989 ft³ | £2,819 – £3,852 | Price mine — 2 bedrooms to Cologne → |
| 3 bedrooms | 45 m³1,589 ft³ | £4,104 – £5,639 | Price mine — 3 bedrooms to Cologne → |
| 4 bedrooms | 62 m³2,190 ft³ | £5,343 – £7,363 | Price mine — 4 bedrooms to Cologne → |
| 5+ bedrooms | 85 m³3,002 ft³ | £6,995 – £9,662 | Price mine — 5+ bedrooms to Cologne → |
Bands are estimates worked out by our pricing engine from the rate card in force today. They are not a quotation. Your price is fixed after a free survey. How the price is worked out
Cologne · Köln
Getting a removal vehicle to your door in Cologne
The Haltverbotszone, and its three-week clock
Kerb space outside a Cologne door is held by an Ausnahmegenehmigung under the road traffic regulations, granted by the Amt für öffentliche Ordnung, and the city asks for the application at least three weeks before the date. It is granted as a rule for one vehicle; the city reckons a seven-and-a-half-tonne lorry needs about fifteen metres of reserved kerb.
Ninety-six hours of signs, and the plates on them
The zone has to stand four days — ninety-six hours — before the move, set out by whoever holds the permission or a firm they engage; the city hires out no boards, so they come from a traffic-safety contractor. Front plates carry the date and times, the back the holder's name and number. Cars standing inside it are reported to the city's traffic service, which on Saturdays opens at nine.
The Grüne Umweltzone, and the Straßensuche
Cologne's low-emission zone takes in a hundred and thirty-seven square kilometres, and only a green Feinstaubplakette gets a vehicle into it, British registration or not. Motorways are left out, so the A1, A3 and A4 ring is open to anything. The boundary runs street by street rather than by district, and the city's Straßensuche is the only thing that settles an address.
Over seven and a half tonnes: a through ban, not a delivery ban
A lorry heavier than seven and a half tonnes may not drive through the inner city, or through parts of Deutz and Mülheim: the area is a Durchfahrtverbotszone. The city's order expressly excepts Anlieferverkehr — delivery traffic within the zone — so a large vehicle may still come to an address inside it. The driver should have the job paperwork naming that address to hand.
Lifts, and the inspection one brings with it
North Rhine-Westphalia's building code makes a lift compulsory only above three storeys, houses aside, and exempts flats added in a loft conversion — so top-floor walk-ups are common here. The city's permit form treats an Außenaufzug, an external furniture lift, as routine: it has its own tick-box and a field for the storey. Using one makes a site inspection compulsory.
How this shows up in your quote. The quote asks about each end of the move. Tick “parking suspension or permit required” or “narrow street” for the Cologne end and each is priced as its own line, along with the floor and whether there is a lift. A furniture hoist is not part of the online price: show us the stairs and windows at your survey and, where one is needed, it is priced then.
Where we deliver in and around Cologne
Belgisches Viertel and the Neustadt
One of the twenty-one inner-city resident-parking areas, and inside the through-traffic ban zone. Assume a reserved kerb will be needed.
Lindenthal and Sülz
Twelve resident-parking areas are listed for this Stadtbezirk, and the Pauliviertel scheme is suspended by a court ruling, so kerb rules there are unsettled.
Marienburg and Bayenthal
Villa streets: detached houses in gardens, long carries from gate to door, mature trees leaning out over the kerb.
Rodenkirchen, Rondorf and Sürth
St George's British International School stands on Husarenstraße in Rondorf, reached by three bus lines. Left-bank suburbs, so no city bridge on the way in.
Widdersdorf, Lövenich and Ossendorf
Cologne International School moved to Rudi-Conin-Straße at Butzweilerhof in November 2022, and older addresses for it still circulate.
Deutz and Mülheim
Right-bank flats beside Koelnmesse, inside the through ban, and reached over bridges two of which are weight-limited.
Porz-Wahn and Porz-Lind
The German Aerospace Center at Linder Höhe and Europe's astronaut centre sit here, out at the south-eastern edge of the city.
Leverkusen and Bonn
Separate cities on the same corridor, each with its own permit office, its own notice period and its own rule about the signs.
The road from the UK to Cologne
Route: Eurotunnel from Folkestone to Calais, then the E40 corridor past Ghent, round the Brussels ring and through Liège, entering Germany at Aachen — about 260 miles from Calais.
Two internal borders and no controls. Belgium meters goods vehicles over three and a half tonnes by the kilometre, loaded or empty, and household goods being your own property exempts nothing. Eastbound on the A4 past Klettenberg, the damaged Eifeltor bridge confines lorries to the right-hand lane.
We collect anywhere in the UK. Collection is free within 30 miles of our Coulsdon depot; beyond that a mileage contribution applies and is shown in your quote.
When to move
Sundays and public holidays stop the work itself
Cologne's permit page says it outright: carrying out a furniture removal is generally prohibited on Sundays and public holidays under the state's Feiertagsgesetz. That stops the job whatever the vehicle weighs. Rosenmontag is not a statutory holiday, yet the centre closes around the parade anyway.
Carnival week
Carnival takes a week out of the winter calendar. In 2027 Weiberfastnacht falls on Thursday 4 February and Rosenmontag on Monday 8 February, with Aschermittwoch on the 10th. Streets around Zülpicher Straße close from early morning, pre-signed no-stopping zones go up days ahead and vehicles left inside them are towed. A private Haltverbotszone is worth nothing there on those days.
Fair weeks, and the marathon morning
Deutz and the right bank tighten when Koelnmesse has a fair on — ORGATEC in late October 2026, imm cologne the following January — and hotel and parking pressure comes with it. The Cologne Marathon closes the Rhine embankment and two bridges on a Sunday in early October; the risk to a move is the night before, when the course is already signed.
Paperwork once you arrive in Cologne
Anmeldung at any Kundenzentrum
Cologne registers new arrivals at any of its nine Kundenzentren, whichever part of the city the flat is in, and wants it done inside the first two weeks. Mondays and Wednesdays are walk-in; the other days need an appointment. Anyone arriving from abroad must attend in person, so the online route is closed to you whatever your papers say.
The Wohnungsgeberbescheinigung has to exist first
Ask the landlord for the written move-in confirmation, the Wohnungsgeberbescheinigung. The city is blunt about it: a tenancy agreement or an informal letter will not do, the move-in date on it may not lie in the future, and it cannot be handed in afterwards. Landlords have two weeks to issue one. Ask for it while your goods are still on the road.
The Ausländeramt on Dillenburger Straße
British nationals who did not obtain a visa or residence permit before leaving have ninety days from arrival to make an appointment with the Foreigners' Authority. In Cologne that is the Ausländeramt on Dillenburger Straße, which sees people by appointment and invitation letter only. Register your address first: the office works from the registered address.
Customs when moving to Germany
Germany requires the Zollamt Übersiedlungsgut declaration for transfer-of-residence relief, with a signed valued inventory and an Anmeldung (residence registration) or proof of a tenancy at the destination address.
Check every document you’ll need for Germany →Official pages worth bookmarking
- Stadt Köln — the removal and delivery permit: who may apply, the three-week notice and the ninety-six-hour sign rule ↗
- Stadt Köln — Straßensuche: whether your own street lies inside the Umweltzone ↗
- Stadt Köln — Feinstaubplakette: the green sticker, including vehicles registered abroad ↗
- Stadt Köln — Durchfahrtverbot für Lastkraftwagen: the through ban over 7.5 tonnes and its delivery exception ↗
- Stadt Köln — Anmeldung: registering your address at a Kundenzentrum within fourteen days ↗
Local rules change. We checked these in September 2026 and confirm the current position for your street when we plan your delivery.
Moving from Cologne back to the UK
Deregistering is its own errand, and lighter than the arrival: no landlord's paper is wanted for an Abmeldung, and someone else may attend for you with written authority. The three-week clock on the kerb permission does not get lighter, though, so it starts when the moving date is fixed and not when the keys go back.
In the quote box, switch to “to the UK” and Cologne moves to the collection end.
Moving to Cologne — your questions
How much does a removal from the UK to Cologne cost?
Transport and customs documentation for a one-bedroom part load from the UK to Cologne cost £1,860 – £2,517, and for a three-bedroom house £4,104 – £5,639. Packing, transit cover and stairs or parking at either end are priced on top, from your own answers. Transit is 3–7 days door to door via Eurotunnel then A16/E40 via Belgium and the Netherlands. Small consignments travel as part loads from around £864 for roughly 5 m³. Your own price depends on volume, the packing and cover you choose, access at both ends and how flexible your dates are — the online quote works it out in about three minutes.
How long does a removal to Cologne take?
Transit to Cologne is typically 3–7 days door to door. We run weekly, both directions. A part load waits for its scheduled run and is given a delivery window; a dedicated vehicle travels direct on the date you choose.
Is my Cologne street inside the Umweltzone?
Only the city's Straßensuche can say. The boundary was drawn street by street and not around Stadtbezirke, so neighbouring streets in one district can fall on opposite sides of it and a district name answers nothing. Enter the street and the house number before you fix anything that depends on the answer. Motorways sit outside the zone, so the ring itself is open to any vehicle.
Who applies for the no-stopping zone, and can I do it myself?
Either of you can — the city takes applications from private individuals and from removal firms alike. It grants one as a rule for a single vehicle; a second needs its own justification. Nobody has to attend in person: the application and the permission both travel by email or fax. Tell us the address and the date as early as you can.
Which Rhine bridge can a loaded removal lorry use?
Not the Deutzer Brücke, shut to vehicles over three and a half tonnes since January 2012, and not the Mülheimer Brücke, capped at two metres eighty and the same weight while its refurbishment runs — the city sends heavier traffic through the Tunnel Kalk. That leaves the Severinsbrücke, the Zoobrücke under thirty tonnes, and the motorway bridges at Rodenkirchen and Leverkusen.
Can we load without a permit if there is a parking bay outside?
Sometimes, for a short load. The city says you may load and unload at a pay-and-display bay at any time without paying, and as a rule in a restricted no-stopping zone, with no permit, provided the work is carried out promptly. Clearing a flat is not promptly: a vehicle standing for hours needs the reserved zone.
My new address is in Leverkusen or Bonn. Is the permit the same?
No — each city runs its own procedure, with its own deadlines. Leverkusen wants the application at least fourteen days ahead and the signs standing three full days before the date, and its municipal depot hires boards out. Bonn takes applications online without a login, reckons on about a week to process them, and expects the signs up four days ahead. Apply to the town the address is in.
How do I book my move to Cologne?
Get your estimate online in about three minutes. You can secure your date straight away with a 25% deposit — refunded in full if the survey changes the price and you would rather not go ahead — or have the free survey first. Either way the survey fixes the price, and the balance is due on the day we collect. Your customs documents, inventory and dates are then handled in your own online portal.
Other cities we deliver to in Germany
- Removals to Berlin
- Removals to Munich
- Removals to Frankfurt
- Removals to Hamburg
- Removals to Düsseldorf
- Removals to Stuttgart
- All of Germany →
Other European destinations
Price your move to Cologne
- About three minutes
- No card needed for a price
- Fixed after a free survey
Cologne, Germany · page reviewed September 2026