COIs and freight elevators: junk removal in Center City Philadelphia buildings

The short answer

Most managed buildings in Center City Philadelphia require three things before anyone removes furniture through the service areas:

• A certificate of insurance naming the building entity and the management company as additional insured.
• A reserved freight elevator in a booked time slot.
• A move window inside the building's permitted hours, which in a lot of Rittenhouse and Washington Square West buildings excludes evenings and sometimes weekends entirely.

We carry general liability cover and issue certificates on request. The prices are unchanged by any of it: a sofa is $126, a queen mattress and box spring set is $143, a dresser is $126, a quarter truck is $241 and a half is $431. The minimum is $75 per visit.

What the building requirements change is the lead time. Allow a few business days.

Which Philadelphia buildings do this

Broadly, anything with a doorman, a management office and a service entrance. That covers most of the residential towers around Rittenhouse Square, Logan Square and the Parkway, Washington Square West, Society Hill, the Market East and Callowhill conversions, and the newer buildings in University City and along the Delaware.

It also covers a lot of the converted-loft buildings in Old City and Northern Liberties, which surprises people — the building is a nineteenth-century warehouse with one small service lift, and that lift is exactly why the rules exist.

Where it does not apply: row homes, twins, and small converted multi-family buildings with no management company. If you live in a three-unit conversion in Fishtown, nobody is asking for a certificate of insurance. Different city, same postcode.

What a certificate of insurance actually needs to say

Buildings are specific, and a certificate with the wrong name on it is a certificate that gets rejected at the loading dock. Before you book, get these from the management office in writing:

• The exact legal name of the building entity. Not the marketing name of the tower — the entity that owns it, which is often an LLC that sounds nothing like the building.
• The exact name of the management company. Frequently a separate entity, sometimes a national firm.
• The mailing address they want on the certificate.
• The coverage types they require and whether they need workers' compensation listed as well as general liability.
• Where to send it and how far in advance.

Send us that list and we produce the certificate. Getting the names wrong is the single most common reason a Center City removal gets turned around in the lobby, and it is entirely preventable.

Booking the freight elevator

This is the part that dictates your date, so do it first.

• Book the lift before you book the truck. Not the other way round. Lift slots in a busy Rittenhouse building go days ahead, and the last week of August goes weeks ahead.
• Ask about the pads. Most buildings require the lift to be padded and will send someone to do it. That is part of your slot.
• Ask about hours. Many Philadelphia buildings restrict service moves to weekday business hours. If you assumed a Saturday, check.
• Ask about a deposit. Some buildings hold a refundable deposit against damage to common areas. That is between you and the building.
• Ask where the truck goes. A loading dock, a service bay off a side street, or — commonly in Center City — a short stretch of curb on a one-way street with a doorman keeping an eye on it.

Then give us the slot and we will be there for it.

What a Center City removal looks like on the day

Smaller than people expect. The apartments are compact and residents in these buildings rarely accumulate the way a four-level row home does. A typical job:

That is $126 + $67 + $68 = $261. A one-bedroom being fully emptied usually lands near the $241 quarter-truck rung or the $431 half.

The work itself is straightforward: unit to service corridor, service corridor to freight lift, lift to dock, dock to truck. The constraint is time — you have a booked window, and the crew works to it.

The things that go wrong, and how to avoid them

• Certificate names do not match. Get them in writing from the management office, not from a neighbor or the lease.
• The lift is booked for the wrong day. Confirm the slot in writing and confirm it again the day before.
• Nobody told the front desk. Even with a certificate on file, the desk needs to know a crew is expected. Ring down in the morning.
• The load is bigger than the slot. A two-hour window and a whole apartment is tight. Tell us the volume and the window together so we send enough people.
• Storage cage forgotten. Many Center City buildings have basement storage. It is a separate trip to the lift, so mention it at booking rather than on the day.
• A wall-mounted TV. Comes off the bracket and goes on the truck at $68, but the drywall patch is a different trade and your lease may require it.

Timing in the Philadelphia calendar

Center City buildings have their own rhythm on top of the city's. Lease turnovers cluster at month ends, and the end of August is the worst possible week to want a freight elevator anywhere in this city — the residential towers are turning over at the same moment as every student block near Drexel and Penn.

If you have flexibility, aim for the middle of a month, midweek, outside August and outside the late-spring settlement rush. You will get the slot you want and the crew will not be working against a queue at the dock.

Frequently asked questions