Scotland Shuttle collects across London on Wednesdays and delivers to Glasgow (G), Stirling and Falkirk (FK) and Edinburgh and the Lothians (EH) postcodes on Thursday mornings, running fortnightly. If you are anywhere in London and your delivery postcode starts with G, FK or EH, your boxes can be in Scotland the morning after collection. Here is how the whole thing works, end to end.
The fixed day model
Most courier and man and van services run whenever a job comes in, which means a long route like London to Scotland is either expensive or unreliable, and often both. The shuttle works the other way round: fixed days, fixed areas, fortnightly. Cambridge is collected on Tuesdays, London on Wednesdays, Oxford and Swindon on Saturdays, and the Scotland run happens on Thursdays, delivering in the morning and collecting southbound items in the afternoon.
Fixed days mean full vans on a planned route instead of half empty vans on random days, which is what makes a 400 mile journey affordable and keeps it reliable. The honest trade off is that you fit the schedule rather than the schedule fitting you. For boxes, bags and luggage going ahead of a move, that is usually an easy trade.
Booking and cutoffs
You book with a London collection postcode, a Scottish delivery postcode and a piece count. A piece is any box, bag or case under 30 kg that one person can carry; pieces are priced at £15 each for 5 to 10 pieces and £12 each for 11 or more, with bikes at £59 and small furniture at £45 per item.
Two things close a run: the cutoff before collection day, and the van filling up, whichever comes first. September and early summer runs fill early. Because the service is fortnightly, missing a run does not cost you a day, it costs you two weeks, so the rule is simple: book as soon as your dates are firm, not when the boxes are packed. If your consignment is over 50 pieces or more than 6 furniture items, it is a small move rather than a shuttle job, and you will be pointed to a removals quote instead.
Wednesday: collection in London
Before collection day you get a four hour window by text. With Kerbside service, from £149, one driver collects everything from the ground floor door, so have it stacked, taped and labelled with your booking reference before the window opens. With Assisted service, from £299, a two person crew carries everything down from any floor.
The driver counts the pieces against your booking, which is why numbering boxes 1 of 9, 2 of 9 and so on is worth the thirty seconds it takes. Anything flammable, perishable or irreplaceable stays with you; the packing guide has the full list.
Overnight at the Oxfordshire hub
London consignments do not go straight up the motorway. They travel to our hub in Oxfordshire, where everything heading north is sorted by delivery area and loaded for the Scotland run. The hub is what lets collections from four different parts of the south, London, Cambridge, Oxford and Swindon, feed one efficient run north.
Your boxes are indoors and secure overnight, and this is flow, not storage: on a normal booking they arrive at the hub on Wednesday evening and leave for Scotland within hours. This is also why the booking reference on every box matters. At the hub, the reference is what keeps your nine boxes together as one consignment among everyone else's.
Thursday: delivery in Scotland
The Scotland run delivers on Thursday mornings across G, FK and EH postcodes, so Glasgow, Stirling, Falkirk, Edinburgh and the Lothians are all covered on the same day. You get a four hour delivery window by text, and someone needs to be there to receive the consignment, whether that is you, a flatmate, a family member or a new landlord who has agreed to take it in.
Kerbside means the driver hands everything over at the door. Assisted means the crew carries everything inside, to any floor. Count the pieces in against your numbered list and the job is done, roughly 24 hours after the van first pulled up in London.
Thursday afternoon: the van does not go home empty
After the morning deliveries, the same run collects southbound consignments across Scotland in the afternoon. Those items travel back through the Oxfordshire hub and are delivered on their area's next fixed day. So if you are reading this from the Scottish end, the whole model works in reverse, and the same booking rules apply.
The four hour window, by text
Nobody wants to wait in all day, and a fixed day service cannot offer you any time that suits. The compromise is a four hour window sent by text for both collection and delivery, so you know which half of the day is yours to plan around. If a window genuinely does not work, say so when you receive it rather than on the day, because on a fixed route the options are the planned stop or the next run a fortnight later.
Before you book, a sixty second check
- collection postcode in London, delivery postcode starting G, FK or EH
- every piece under 30 kg and liftable by one person
- piece count accurate, furniture items listed separately
- under 50 pieces and 6 or fewer furniture items
- a receiver available in Scotland on the Thursday
- boxes taped, numbered and labelled with the booking reference
Get those right and sending boxes from London to Scotland is genuinely boring, in the best possible way: a Wednesday handover, a Thursday text, and your belongings waiting at the other end.