Office Relocation: The Network and Comms Checklist

The most reliable way to plan the network side of a relocation is to start from the confirmed move date and work backwards, rather than starting from the beginning and hoping everything lines up in time. Carrier lead-in orders, cabling installation and comms room fit-out all have their own timeframes, and some of these can take considerably longer than people expect.

Setting rough dates for site inspection, carrier ordering, cabling completion, and a test day before the actual move gives everyone involved, including the cabling contractor and the internet provider, a shared timeline to work towards rather than a single deadline sprung on them late.

Before committing to a fit-out layout, it is worth having a cabling contractor walk the new premises to assess where the comms room or cupboard will sit, where existing cabling pathways exist, and whether the building's telecommunications infrastructure, such as risers or existing pit and pipe, will support the planned layout.

This inspection often reveals things that are not obvious from a floor plan alone, such as a comms room location that is inconveniently far from where desks are planned, or a lack of existing pathway between floors in a multi-level tenancy. Finding this out early is far cheaper than finding it out after fit-out has started.

Ordering internet and any other carrier services for the new address should happen as early as possible in the process, because these lead times are frequently the longest part of the whole relocation and are largely outside your direct control. Whether the new premises already has an active service, needs a new connection, or requires an NBN relocation, confirm the process and expected timeframe directly with your provider.

Where a business cannot tolerate a gap in connectivity, it is worth discussing options such as running both the old and new connections briefly in parallel, or arranging a temporary mobile broadband solution to cover any gap between the old service ending and the new one going live.

Once the site inspection is complete and the fit-out layout is settled, cabling installation can be scheduled. This covers structured cabling to each work area and access point location, cabling to the comms room for switches and the carrier equipment, and any additional cabling for CCTV, access control or point-of-sale systems.

The comms room itself needs enough power, ideally on a protected circuit, adequate ventilation, and physical space for racking, patch panels and switches with room to work. Cabling should be tested and labelled clearly as it goes in, rather than left until the end, since a mislabelled comms room is a recurring source of wasted time for years afterward.

Wireless coverage and wired data points both depend on decisions made during the fit-out design phase, not afterward. Planning access point positions against the actual floor plan, factoring in walls, meeting rooms and expected device density, avoids the common problem of patchy Wi-Fi in a brand new office.

Similarly, deciding how many data points each desk or workstation needs, and where shared equipment like printers will sit, should happen before cabling is run rather than being retrofitted with surface-mounted cable after the fact.

The cutover from old to new premises is the moment where planning either pays off or falls apart. A clear cutover plan should set out exactly when the old services will be disconnected, when the new services go live, and what the fallback is if something does not work as expected on the day.

For phone systems, confirm with your provider how numbers will be transferred or ported to the new location and whether there is any expected downtime during that process. Testing the new connection and phone system before the official move day, where the timeline allows it, significantly reduces the risk of a bad surprise on day one.

It is easy to focus entirely on the new premises and forget that the old site still needs attention. Equipment such as switches, access points and any owned hardware needs to be removed, and cabling that belongs to the business rather than the landlord may need to be documented for future reference or removed depending on the lease terms.

Coordinate the timing of decommissioning with the lease end date and with whoever is managing the make-good, so nothing critical is removed too early or left behind too late.

Most commercial leases include make-good clauses that require the tenant to return the premises to a defined condition, which can include removing cabling, patch panels and mounted equipment that was installed during the tenancy. It is worth reviewing these obligations with whoever manages the lease well before the move date, since make-good work often needs to be scheduled and budgeted separately from the new site's fit-out.

Even with careful planning, having support available on the first day at the new premises is worthwhile, since staff moving into a new environment tend to surface small issues quickly, such as a desk without a working port or a printer that has not been reconnected. Having a contact on call for the first day or two smooths over these issues before they become frustrations.