Tax records storage centre in Peterborough is set to close

The 70,000 sq ft warehouse and storage units in Manasty Road, in Orton Southgate, have been declared surplus to requirements by HM Revenue and Customs.

The move is part of a national shake up of HMRC offices that will see the closure of two offices in Peterborough - in Clifton House, Broadway, by 2018 and in Churchgate, New Road, by 2021, and which together employ 232 staff.

The storage centre contains in excess of two million individual records that take up more than 40,000 metres of shelving.

A date for the closure of the centre has not been given however the lease for the building is already on the market.

A HMRC spokesman said the centre employs a handful of people who will be transferred to its offices in Churchgate.

He said: “As HMRC modernises and digitises its processes there is a diminishing requirement for the retention and storage of paper records.

“The documents stored at Manasty Road will be transferred to another secure storage location.

“Negotiations are currently ongoing to determine the location of that storage and the impact this transfer will have on the HMRC staff currently working at Manasty Road.”

Commercial agents Barker Storey Matthews have been instructed by the buildings’ owners, Mapeley STEPS, to market the lease.

The centre is made up of two blocks of three units, which are each 5.4 metres high and could be leased individually or as a whole.

It is thought the new buildings will quickly occupied as the city currently faces a shortage of good sized office and industrial premises.

Julian Welch, director at Barker Storey Matthews, said: “There is very little stock around in the city at present with virtually nothing larger than 30,000 sq ft.

“So we are confident that this opportunity will attract interest from not only local occupiers but also from the regional and national markets.”

“This type of facility does not come to the market very often, and is ideally suited to a company looking for a ready-made storage facility of this type.

“The units are all interconnected, but can be let either as a whole, as individual units, or as combinations from 10,000 to 70,000 sq ft.

“Whilst they are currently fitted out as a document storage facility, the units could be put to a wide variety of other uses.

“In particular units 4, 5 & 6 have full cover mezzanine floors with goods lifts to the first floor level.

Mr Welch added: “The units are ideally located adjacent to the A1(M) giving easy access to the national road network.”

Related:

Anxious wait for 232 staff at Peterborough’s closure-threatened tax offices