Buying & cost
How to read a pallet invoice
Most pallet invoices are six lines long and four of them are worth interrogating. Here is what each one should say.
Request a quote
Talk to the people who wrote this
Same form, same inbox. Technical questions get answered whether or not there is an order attached.
In short
A pallet invoice should let you reconstruct the price from first principles: unit price by footprint and grade, quantity, freight, and any core credit. If any of those is bundled into an unexplained total, you cannot compare suppliers and you cannot spot drift.
The lines worth questioning are freight, fuel surcharge, condition adjustment and restocking — because those are where an ambiguous quote turns into a different price.
The lines that should be there
Footprint and grade, separately
'Used pallets — 480' is not a line item, it is a summary. You want '48×40 GMA, Grade B, 480 @ $x'. Without the grade on the invoice, you have no record of what you agreed and no basis for a claim if the load was wrong.
Quantity as delivered, not as ordered
These differ more often than people expect. The invoice should reflect the count agreed on the ground at delivery. If it reflects the order, somebody is not counting.
Freight, shown or explicitly included
Either is fine. What is not fine is silence. 'Delivered price' should be stated as delivered, so you know a later 'freight adjustment' is a change rather than a clarification.
Core credit, if you sold anything back
If a two-way lane collected your cores on the same visit, that credit belongs on the same document. Netting it silently against the unit price hides both numbers.
The lines worth a question
Fuel surcharge. Legitimate on long hauls, and it should be a stated percentage against a stated index, not a round number that appears sometimes.
Condition adjustment. This is the one to watch on the *selling* side. If you sold cores at an agreed per-core price and the invoice comes back with a downward condition adjustment, ask what changed and when it was assessed. Our position is that condition is assessed at collection with your person present, so there is nothing to adjust afterwards.
Restocking. Reasonable on a change-of-mind return of stock items. Not reasonable on a grade failure — that is a supplier problem and should be a straight credit.
Pallet deposit. Common in pooled systems, unusual in outright purchase. If you are buying pallets and there is a deposit line, you may be in a pooling arrangement you did not intend to join.
Comparing two quotes properly
Unit price alone is close to useless as a comparison. Three adjustments make quotes comparable.
- Normalise the grade. A Grade A quote and a Grade B quote are not the same product. If one supplier will not put a written grade definition behind their number, that is your answer.
- Normalise the freight. Move both to delivered, at your dock, in the quantity you actually order.
- Normalise the cadence. A price for a full truckload is not a price for a forty-pallet drop. Ask both suppliers to quote the load size you genuinely take.
Do those three things and the spread between suppliers usually narrows dramatically — which tells you the real differences are service, consistency and whether they will take a bad load back.
What we put on ours
Footprint, grade, quantity as counted, unit price, freight where separate, core credit where applicable, and the quote reference the price came from. Prices are held for fourteen days from quotation.
We do not apply condition adjustments after collection and we do not add surcharges that were not on the quote. If a load does not match the grade quoted, tell us and we collect it — that is a credit, not a restocking fee.
More on the pricing logic in eleven ways to cut your pallet spend.
Takeaways
- Grade and footprint belong on the invoice, not just in the conversation.
- Quantity should reflect the count agreed on the ground.
- Condition adjustments applied after collection are a red flag on the selling side.
- Normalise grade, freight and cadence before comparing two quotes.
Questions
Asked and answered
Should freight be included in the pallet price?
Either approach is fine as long as it is stated. What causes disputes is a price that is silent on freight and then acquires a freight line later.
Is a restocking fee reasonable?
On a change-of-mind return of stock items, yes. On a load that failed to match the grade quoted, no — that is a supplier error and belongs as a straight credit.
Written by
Priya Raghunathan
Operations & Programs
Builds the multi-site pallet programmes and does the baseline audits. Keeps the spreadsheets everybody else quotes from.
Disagree with something here? That is genuinely useful to us — several of these articles exist because a customer told us we had it wrong. Use the form at the top of the page or write to the yard directly.
Terms used here
Definitions live in one place so they cannot drift. Full list in the pallet glossary.
- Core
- An unsorted used pallet as received from a generator, before grading. The raw material of a pallet yard.
- Grade A
- A used pallet with original unrepaired stringers, seven or more top deck boards and no significant damage. Also called #1.
- Grade B
- A used pallet that may have one repaired or companion stringer and replaced boards. Also called #2.
- Two-way lane
- A route where a truck delivers pallets and collects used cores on the same visit.
Keep reading
Related notes
Audit your pallet spend in an afternoon
The most common finding is not a bad price. It is one site buying pallets while another pays to throw the same pallets away.
Buying & costThe two-way lane, and why it beats any price negotiation
A truck that arrives full and leaves empty has wasted half its journey. Somebody pays for that half whether or not it appears on an invoice.
Buying & costWhat happens to your pallet price when lumber moves
The two halves of this business respond to completely different signals, which is why the gap between them widens and narrows.