Britannia AuctionsCommercial vehicle and fleet auctions in Southampton
A port the size of Southampton's keeps a lot of vehicles busy, and it makes a lot of them surplus. Container haulage yards at Millbrook and the distribution sheds at Nursling and Adanac Park run tractor units and skeletal trailers on shipping line contracts that are won and lost on tender. When a contract moves, a yard can have twenty units and forty trailers with nothing to pull. Boatbuilders and marine engineers along the Itchen and Southampton Water run pickups and panel vans that come up for sale when a yard changes hands or a refit season ends.
We sell all of it by online timed auction. Vehicles are photographed and described where they stand, bidding runs a week or two with a viewing day, and buyers pay us before they collect.
Bidding is not limited to the area, and Fareham, Totton, Eastleigh and Portsmouth are a manageable drive from the viewing day.
Container haulage fleets between Millbrook and Nursling
Container work is contract work. A haulier at Millbrook Trading Estate or on the Nursling estate runs skeletal trailers and tractor units against a shipping line or forwarder agreement, and when the agreement goes elsewhere the vehicles are the first cost to cut. The same kit is run by yards all around the Western Docks, so a skeletal trailer with a current plating certificate and sound twist locks is as familiar to a local bidder as to one online.
We list each trailer with its plating date, its tyre condition, the state of the twist locks and photographs of the chassis, and each tractor unit with mileage, MOT date, cab condition and a note of any faults. Bidders can inspect on the viewing day, and the M271 runs from the M27 to the docks, so collection from a dockside yard is a short trip off the motorway.
Boatyard pickups and vans along the Itchen
Marine trades run a different fleet. A boatbuilder or engineer on the Itchen has a couple of pickups, a long wheelbase van fitted out as a mobile workshop, a car derived van and a plant trailer for moving a tender or an engine. These come to us one business at a time, usually when the owner retires or the yard lease ends, and they are sold alongside the workshop equipment in the same catalogue.
Fitted out vans are worth describing properly. Racking, a bench, an inverter and a roof rack are all worth listing, so we photograph the load area as carefully as the outside. A pickup that has spent its life on a slipway needs an honest note about the underside, and we give one, because anyone who comes to the viewing day will look underneath.
Where the approach to a yard will not take a transporter, the vehicles are collected and sold from our own premises.
What these sales can include
- Panel vans
- Long wheelbase vans
- Luton box vans with tail lifts
- Tippers and dropside trucks
- Refrigerated vans
- Rigid lorries
- Tractor units
- Curtainside trailers
- Flatbed and skeletal trailers
- Minibuses and welfare vehicles
- Pickups and 4x4s
- Car derived vans
- Plant trailers
- Vehicle mounted equipment
How the sale runs
We photograph and describe each vehicle, record the mileage and note known faults. The vehicles are listed in an online timed auction and the catalogue is marketed to trade buyers, hauliers, owner drivers and export buyers. Bidders can inspect on a viewing day, usually at your yard or ours, and lots close in sequence on the sale date.
Lots are offered as seen under the auction terms, and buyers are expected to inspect before bidding. The buyer pays the hammer price plus a buyer's premium, with VAT charged where it applies and shown separately on the buyer's invoice. Your charge is a separate commission, with any costs agreed in advance, deducted from the proceeds.
Reserves can be set on individual vehicles where there is a clear reason, such as a finance settlement figure.
The commercial vehicle and fleet auctions page covers when auction suits a fleet, paperwork that affects the price, livery and fleet kit, after the hammer.
Questions about selling in Southampton
- Our haulage contract at the docks ends in six weeks. Is that enough time to sell twelve tractor units and the trailers?
Yes. Six weeks is a comfortable run for a fleet that size, though the dates depend on the number of lots and the access. We catalogue in the first week, bidding runs for a week or two, buyers collect in the days after the close, and the yard can go back clean with time to spare. The one thing that slows a sale is finance. A unit on hire purchase stays with the funder until the agreement is settled, so ask for settlement figures now rather than after the auction closes, because a vehicle cannot be released without their agreement.
- We are marine engineers at Hedge End with two vans and a pickup. Is that too small a job for you?
No. Any job, big or small. Three vehicles from a marine engineer sell in the same online auction as a fleet from a distribution shed, and they get the same photographs and the same description. If you are closing the workshop as well, the lathes, welders, compressors and hand tools go in the same catalogue as the vans, so the unit is cleared on one set of collection days rather than two. The same person deals with you from the first call to the day you are paid.
More questions about vehicles and fleets
Related services
Guides
- Selling a commercial vehicle fleet
Fleet sales turn on paperwork as much as on price. This guide covers the V5C, MOT and plating documents, clearing finance before listing, keys and livery, recording mileage and tachograph data, and how to defleet in batches while still trading.