Programme · audit
The pallet audit checklist
We run this at the start of every management programme. You can run it yourself in an afternoon, and most of the savings are visible before we ever quote you.
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Send this and a real person in the Columbus yard reads it. Most quotes go out the same business day.
In short
A pallet audit maps what you buy, what you generate, what you throw away and what it all costs across every site — before anyone negotiates a price. In most multi-site operations the audit alone reveals a site buying new pallets while another pays to dispose of them.
The twenty-two questions below are the ones we ask. Work through them and you will know more about your pallet spend than most operations ever do.
Volumes and flows
- How many pallets does each site receive inbound per week?
- How many does each site ship outbound per week?
- How many are purchased per week, and from whom?
- How many leave the site and never return?
- How many accumulate as idle stock, and how fast?
- Is any site both buying and disposing of pallets?
That last question is the one that most often produces a silence.
Specification
- What sizes are in use, and why each one?
- What grade is specified, and by whom, and when was that decided?
- Which lanes actually involve racking?
- Which lanes are one-way, never to return?
- Which lanes cross an international border?
- Is any ISPM-15 stock being used domestically?
- Does the load overhang the deck, or is the deck oversized for the load?
Cost and disposal
- What is the delivered unit cost by size and grade, by site?
- What is paid annually for pallet disposal or waste hauling?
- What expedite or rush charges were incurred last year?
- Is freight quoted separately or buried in the unit price?
- What is the product damage rate attributable to pallet failure or overhang?
Structure
- How many suppliers across the group, at how many price points?
- Is ordering scheduled or reactive?
- Could any site pair delivery with collection on the same truck?
- Is anyone measuring diversion tonnage for sustainability reporting?
Answer those four and the structural savings become obvious without any negotiation at all. Then read eleven ways to cut pallet spend and work down the list.
Where to get each answer
The questions are easy. Finding the answers inside an organisation is the actual work, and knowing where to look saves days.
- Volumes in and out — receiving and shipping records, or a physical count over one representative week if the records do not separate pallets.
- Purchases — accounts payable, searched by supplier rather than by category. Pallets are frequently miscoded.
- Disposal cost — the waste hauling contract, usually held by facilities. This is the single hardest number to find and often the largest.
- Expedite charges — freight invoices, filtered for premium and rush.
- Damage — quality or claims records, filtered for crushing and load failure.
- Specification — ask the person who places the order why that grade. The answer is frequently 'it is what we have always had', which is itself the finding.
- Lane characteristics — walk the dock for an hour. This is faster and more accurate than any system.
Reference
Data sources by question
| Question | Where to look | Difficulty |
|---|---|---|
| Pallets in and out per week | Receiving/shipping records, or a week's count | Easy |
| Purchase volume and price | AP, searched by supplier name | Easy |
| Disposal cost | Waste hauling contract, held by facilities | Hard |
| Expedite charges | Freight invoices, filtered for premium | Medium |
| Damage from pallet failure | Claims and quality records | Hard |
| Which lanes rack | Walk the dock | Easy |
| Why this grade | Ask the buyer | Easy — and revealing |
| Sites buying and disposing | Compare AP against the waste contract | Medium |
Avoid these
Mistakes we see
Skipping the disposal number because it is hard to find
It is frequently the largest single finding. Its difficulty is exactly why nobody has looked before.
Auditing from systems rather than from the dock
An hour on the dock tells you more about how pallets are actually used than a week of reports.
Excluding small sites
Small sites are where the worst practices survive, because nobody has examined them.
Checklist
Work through this before you order
Audit day plan
- Morning: walk the dock, watch a receiving and a shipping cycle
- Count the idle pile and estimate its age
- Ask the buyer why the current grade
- Photograph the storage area and the pallet stacks
- Afternoon: pull AP by supplier and the waste contract
- Note which lanes rack, ship one-way or export
- Write findings the same day, while the dock is fresh
Questions
Before you ask us
How long does a pallet audit take?
An internal one takes an afternoon per site plus whatever time it takes to pull historic invoice data, which is usually the slow part. A full programme baseline with us runs two to four weeks across multiple sites.
Do you charge for the audit?
No. The audit is how we work out whether a programme makes sense for you, and it frequently concludes that it does not, in which case straightforward buying and selling is simpler for everybody.
What does an audit usually find?
Most commonly: one grade used everywhere regardless of application, treated stock on domestic lanes, one site disposing of pallets while another buys, and no two-way lane where geography would obviously permit one.
Can we run the audit ourselves?
Yes, and you should. The twenty-two questions on this page are the whole method. Knowing your own numbers before talking to any supplier is the single best position to negotiate from.
Can we run this without telling suppliers?
Yes, and it is often better. The audit is about understanding your own operation. Bringing suppliers in before you know your numbers means negotiating from their information rather than yours.
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