Although vanrental.co.uk is dedicated to van hire, we’re always trying to help visitors find the cheapest, most effective way to move their stuff — and sometimes, van hire isn’t the best answer.

Today, I’d like to tell you about an alternative service that offers a real alternative to van hire.

Basically, the idea is that you hire empty space in a courier van, and the courier will take your item and deliver it to its destination. The service is called Anyvan.com and it’s something I mentioned in a recent vanrental.co.uk newsletter, but in case you missed it, here’s a quick summary.

• List your item online with details of its size, location and destination
• Couriers who will be in your area with empty space in their vans will provide you with quotes through the Anyvan system.
• You choose the best quote, then sit back and wait for your item to be collected…
• …and delivered to its destination — all without you having to drive anywhere.

To me, it sounds like an ideal way of collecting or delivering a large eBay purchase — maybe a sofa or wardrobe that won’t fit in a car.

In my view, there are two particular situations where you could save a lot of money by using Anyvan.com instead of hiring a van:

1. Your delivery destination is a long way away, so if you hired a van, you would have a lot of fuel to pay for, or would have to pay extra for a one-way hire and then catch a train or bus back home -> it’s all very expensive.
   
2. You only have one or two items to move, but they won’t quite fit in your car, or you don’t have a car. If you hired a van, it would be 3/4 empty but you’d still have to pay the full cost of the hire and fuel -> it’s all very expensive.

Regular users on Anyvan get eBay-style user ratings, so you can see how reliable other people have found their services. In some ways, the whole setup is a bit like eBay — and indeed, it’s ideal to use for large eBay purchases, as I mentioned above.

Anyvan.com is an interesting new service that I think could be worth a look if you have one or two large items that need to go in a van, but won’t fill it up.