Britannia AuctionsPlant and construction equipment auctions in Norwich
Plant in Norfolk is as likely to be in a farmyard as on a building site. Agricultural contractors and growers around Norwich run telehandlers, mini diggers, dumpers and rollers alongside their tractors, and when a farm business retires or a contractor gives up the drainage and groundworks side, that plant comes to us in the same way a builder's fleet does.
The construction trade is here too. Housing sites around the city and the trade estates at Longwater and Rackheath keep contractors busy, and their compounds hold the usual excavators, rollers, cabins and generators when a job finishes.
We sell both kinds by online timed auction. Rural sites beyond the ring road are a collection question more than a selling question, and we deal with that below. Use the contact form to tell us what you have and where it stands.
Rural yards and the lorry that can reach them
A farm contractor's yard down a lane near Aylsham or Dereham may be no place for an articulated step frame, so rural sites beyond the ring road are looked at before anything is listed. We check the lane, the gate, the turning space, the hard standing and the loading point, then agree how each machine leaves, whether that is a smaller rigid vehicle, a plant trailer, or walking a larger excavator out to a hard standing on the road where the lorry can wait.
Where the yard is too far from a usable road, we can collect the plant and sell it from our own premises. The buyer then collects from a yard built for it.
Whichever way the sale runs, every lot states where it stands and what vehicle is needed to collect it, so a buyer from Wymondham, Attleborough, North Walsham or Diss knows before bidding.
Two trades wanting the same machines
A Norwich plant catalogue has two trades looking at the same machines. Builders and groundworks firms want dumpers, mini diggers, rollers and telehandlers for sites. Farm contractors and growers use the same machines for ditching and yard work, and their season runs from after harvest through the drainage months, so the date of a sale is worth discussing before it is fixed.
Telehandlers with agricultural attachments suit either trade, so we list the attachments as separate lots with the carriage type stated. Fuel bowsers and generators are lotted for both.
The offshore energy supply chain at Great Yarmouth is another user of generators, compressors, lighting towers and welfare units, and online bidding is open to bidders well beyond the area for the higher hour machines as well as the tidy ones.
What these sales can include
- Excavators and mini diggers
- Dumpers and site dumpers
- Telehandlers
- Generators and lighting towers
- Compressors and breakers
- Rollers and compaction equipment
- Site cabins and welfare units
- Scaffolding and access equipment
- Concrete mixers and pumps
- Buckets, quick hitches and attachments
- Plant trailers
- Surveying equipment and small tools
- Fuel bowsers and tanks
How the auction works
Each machine is a lot with a full description, photographs and the hour reading. Bidding runs online for a set period, usually one to two weeks, and lots close in sequence. A bid in the last minutes extends the close for that lot.
Plant is 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 invoice. Payment is required before removal.
Buyers arrange and pay for the removal of their lots within the agreed window. What that takes depends on the machine: wheeled plant with road registration can be driven away, and tracked or heavy machines go on a low loader. Nothing leaves the site until it is paid for and signed out.
The plant and construction equipment auctions page covers what buyers want to know, finance and ownership checks, where the sale runs from, reserves and the market, alternatives.
Questions about selling in Norwich
- We are retiring from a farm contracting business near Wymondham with a mix of tractors and construction plant. Do you sell both?
Yes, in the same sale. Telehandlers, dumpers, diggers and rollers go into the plant catalogue and tractors and implements sit alongside them, since the two trades overlap. We catalogue at the farm, run the viewing day there and agree collection slots so the lane is not blocked. Anything on finance, hire purchase or lease stays with the funder until the agreement is settled and can only be sold with their agreement, so we ask about that early.
- How does a buyer from Great Yarmouth collect a mini digger from a site off the Broadland Northway?
With a plant trailer or a beavertail, in most cases, and the catalogue says what each lot needs. Broadland Business Park and the sites around it have hard standing, and we check the gate and the loading point before the sale as we would anywhere. The Northway takes the buyer onto the A47 for the coast. Collection is by booked slot after the close and after payment has cleared, and the buyer's driver signs a release note for the machine.
More questions about plant and construction
Related services
Guides
- How used machinery is valued
Buyers pay for what a machine will do for them, less what it costs to get it out and running. This guide explains how make, hours, tooling, demand and removal cost feed a guide price, and why that price is not book value.
- 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.