By TEH SHI NING

REMOVAL companies here are all keeping busy with the usual June spike in demand for their services. But the impact of the downturn on business seems to differ from one mover to another.

Trucks and crates bearing names such as Alliance Pickfords and KC Dat have always been more visible this time of the year. Expatriate contracts typically coincide with the closure of international schools for the summer vacation, hence the larger number of international moves.

However, while some say the full bookings now mask overall dampened demand and business has deteriorated from last year, others say that the recession has pushed move volumes past seasonal highs.

'We are busy simply because it's the export season,' says Bill Cain, managing director of Santa Fe Relocation Services. Overall moves have decreased by 25 per cent over the past six months. Year on year, moves out of Singapore have held up, but moves in have fallen 20 per cent.

Alan Steyer, general manager of Raffles Movers International, concurs. Summer bookings are high, but volumes overall have been lower this year than last, he says.

Raffles Movers' inbound international moves have plunged 80 per cent year on year, he says, as hiring demand for expatriates dries up. Uncertainty over where the next job lies has also slowed outbound moves but boosted demand for storage services as customers postpone actual moves, says Mr Steyer.

A similar story unfolded at UTS Family Movers, which has seen a 20 per cent decline in sales from last year. Leon Bock, Family Movers' general manager, observed that while bigger moving companies have reported declines, those which see the opposite tend to be smaller players, which also have the most competitive pricing.

UniGroup WorldWide's business has improved, its marketing and communications manager Liona Potrikus says. 'There are a lot of expats moving out of Singapore.' It still sees among its customers expats who have been retrenched or who leave after their compensation packages were significantly reduced.

But the increase has not been confined to relocations abroad. Domestic moves, too, have been on the rise, and part of the story here is, again, recession-driven.

This article was first published in The Business Times.