Crew cab van hire for moving the team and the kit in a single vehicle.

What a crew cab van actually is

A crew cab van — Ford Transit Double Cab, Mercedes-Benz Sprinter Crew Van, Volkswagen Crafter Crew, Vauxhall Vivaro Doublecab — is a panel van with a second row of seats added behind the driver. Five-seat versions are usually built on small or medium chassis (Vivaro, Transit Custom); six-seat versions sit on medium or large chassis (Transporter, Sprinter, Crafter, large Transit). The trade-off is direct: every passenger seat past the front row costs around half a cubic metre of load volume and 50 to 80 kg of payload.

Who typically hires a crew cab van

Multi-person site teams in trades and construction (carpentry crews, fit-out teams, mobile electricians working in pairs); utilities crews (water, telecoms, fibre installers) who travel with materials and a four-person team; highways and grounds maintenance contractors; events and broadcast crews carrying kit plus four or five people. The decision is almost always about replacing a van-plus-car combination with a single vehicle — cheaper to run, easier to insure, easier to park on one site.

Which hire route tends to fit

Utility and infrastructure contractors with multi-year framework contracts usually run crew cabs on contract hire — fixed monthly cost, maintenance bundled, predictable through the contract. Trades businesses running a stable team typically take long-term hire (12 to 36 months). Project-driven work — a six-month fit-out, a one-year cable-pull contract — usually fits flexi hire because the team size and vehicle need ends with the project.

Crew van versus Kombi — and the seat-payload trade-off

A crew van (DCIV — dual-cab in-van) is goods-classed and keeps commercial-vehicle tax and VAT treatment. A Kombi (e.g. Ford Custom Kombi, Sprinter Tourer) is passenger-classed — the same vehicle shape but registered as a minibus or people-carrier — and has different tax, VAT, and insurance treatment. Confirm with your accountant if it matters. Every seat past the front row reduces load volume; we will tell you in the enquiry response if your team-plus-load brief needs a larger chassis to fit.