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Look before you leap into a pallet pool

21st October 1977
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Which of the following most accurately describes the problem?

PALLET recovery schemes involving payments to drivers For their collections may not 3e new. But as the industry.

once again, approaches the ara of productivity deals, professional transport manejers will do well to compare lotes.

During a recent Kenilworth ;eminar on the cost of palletisa ion, with speakers from the nstitutes of Materials Handing, and Prchasing and Sup Dly, I was reminded that pallet :ollection work could be highly )rofitable to some drivers. It :ould also be highly unecononic if the management of the )allet collection operation be:omes slap happy.

There are other risks which :ould involve operators and Myers sailing too close to the vind and landing in court, with erious penalties.

A few months ago, at Jottingham, a pallet dealer, Dund guilty of dishonestly aceiving a large number of tolen pallets, was fined a total

f £4,650 (including costs). The river who had originally stolen -le pallets had earlier been rosecuted and fined.

At the hearing, many large pallet operators said that, whilehey would prefer to use their wn pallets, this was not always aasible. There was the tendeny to interchange pallets on a ne-for-one basis, regardless of le strict ownership of the all ets.

The judge accepted the bona de one-for one exchange, but e condemned the practice of Dme pallet dealers who "di)ctly or indirectly" sold back allets to the firms who really Nned them.

A. J. West, distribution irector, RHM Foods Ltd, told le seminar that his company aid drivers 5p for every !turned pallet, or 71/2 p if they -turned more than 100 a week.

These sums, he thought, ligh be insuffient to motivate today's economic climate. Dme companies apparently ay up to 25p to drivers for each allet returned. Clearly, any iver collecting 200 pallets a eek by the exercise of initiative ould find the extra £50 in his ly packet very useful indeed. -ivers I have known would split e rewards with warehouse

3ff. .

RHM Foods found that some their normally productive ivers went off their route to 'fleet the 71/2p per pallet when, ter in the week, the same illets would have been picked ) as a matter of routine by drivers paid 5p.

Many people have suggested that the problem of pallet return would be solved if a deposit was charged by food manufacturers, or other pallet owners, against the return of the pallets.

Mr West regretted that this was impossible for the good reason that the grocery trade would not accept it.

Others have suggested that goods should not be delivered on pallets. In many trades, palletisation is too well-established to alter. Methods of unit loading eliminating the cost, weight and volume of pallets, may one day be introduced widely — one day.

Although pallet pools, such as the excellent GKN /Chep pool, largely based on Australian experience, provides a solution for some companies, any idea of a universal pallet pool seems to be a non-starter. There are many types and sizes of pallets. The food trades insist on clean, uncontaminated pallets. Specially designed, durable, pallets are restricted for use on close-circuit type operations.

Despite the efforts made by food manufacturers to ensure

the quick turnround and return of pallets, it appears that even such professionals as RHM Foods are not infrequently told: "If you don't collect your pallets, I'll burn them.

Many pallet owners, of course, clearly identify ownership by stencilled or branded marking. But the mind boggles at the difficulty of bringing a successful legal action where a lorry driver has a load of pallets, some of which can be legally accounted for and others cannot.

Rapid turnround

There would, sometimes, be problems if a supplier could prove he gave a number of pallets to a driver for delivery to a consignee if the consignees later denied receiving them. At many warehouses and delivery points there is such a rapid turnround of pallets on a one-for-one basis that any one of a dozen operators — independent hauliers and own account operators — could have been involved.

Gordon Carleton (Pallet Enterprises), a man with a vast experience of pallet manufactu.re and use, thought food

manufacturers were their ov worst enemies. If the 10 or ' major manufacturers agreed ( a standard pallet specially mai for the grocery trade, sui pallets could be brand-mark( and the problem would I largely solved.

Mr West did not disagre There had been an unoffici pallet pool for years, he said, b there were many problems formalising such a poolt system.

The crux of the pallet retu problem is that the pallet shou be seen not as part of the loa but as part of the transpc equipment. When the pallet is a manufacturer's warehouse, is his pigeon. On a vehicle and this applies if the lorry operated by a profession haulier — the pallet becomes h responsibility. At the custi mer's premises, his "posse sion" of the pallets makes the return his responsibility, a though he is not the owner.

Should the haulier involve in pallet movements for h customer receive addition; remuneration for the additioni supervision called for? In competitive market, hauliel :n quote, having regard to e of delivery and turnround. it does not help the pallet sers if valuable pallets go sing, and no one takes aonsibility for their safe and mpt return to the owning apany.

iargeable

Some large companies, such 3oots the Chemists, with over 0 palletised suppliers, have angements with 60 regular )pliers for chargeable pallets. -haps there is a strong case more interchange of expesce of documentation prohires for the orderly collecs and return of pallets. If so, it fital that the professional road Jlier — who, as a "middlein", knows as much as yone in a difficult and often aensive exercise — should be at fully in the picture.

The difficulties of obtaining reernent within the UK on lets of standardised size and istruction are such that there ams no reasonable hope of rly agreement. On the ernational scene, agreement wen less remotely possible. • Colin Swinbank, packaging -ordinator, Imperial Chemical Justries Ltd, and chairman of a British Standards Institute ckaging and Freight Contair Standards Committee, has ited that a rationalised range four unit load sizes, suitable use in freight containers, was culated as a Draft lnternatioI Standard, but universal reement has yet to be ached.

There was an ad hoc I ntergornmental Conference in Nomber 1976 when developing itions sought an International )nvention of Freight Contai!rs and, by implication, related lit-load sizes.

Clearly, developing nations the receiving end of exports )rn the industrialised counes, need to purchase suitable. juipment for the rapid handig of cargo from containers, or ,nt in unit load form. The Acker loading of their own

• imary produce or other goods so demands some equipment andardisation for maximum ficiency.

Mr Swinbank anticipated a arkect increase in the use of lit loads to and from all terseas countries regardless of le method of transport used. sere were, he said at the enilworth seminar, trends tvay from traditional packages bulk and intermediate bulk antainers — themselves spealised forms of unit loads.

For ro-ro movements to and om Europe, and even the Middle East, he thought the palletised loads familiar in Britain would tend to be used. This could also prove true for some long-distance movements by cargo vessels.

He expected that there would be increased use of expendable slings and for intermodal movements by freight containers it would be increasingly important for the full height of the contained to be utilised. For this, low-profile pallets and other forms of unit load, including "well" pallets, were being used successfully, and there were useful developments with skid-boards and palletless unit loads.

Mr Swinbank highlighted some realities. If you could load 80 to 120 drums in a container in 30 minutes, there was no point in putting drums on pallets to save 15 minutes.

A factor that is variable is, of course, the facilities for off-loading cargo at the port in an undeveloped country. In many countries, there is a great availability of labour and little obvious desire, locally, to displace labour with mechanical handling devices on Western models. The road infrastructure for the disposal of goods inland is also relevant and highly variable. It seems unlikely that many impoverished developing countries will be able to afford the money to build road networks, bridges, etc, akin to European networks for many years.

Even ICI, with long experience of unit load/pallet handling of goods, finds it necessary to use pallets in four sizes, viz 1,000 x 1,200mm; 800 x 1,100mm; 1,100 x 1,100mm and 1,320 x 1,100mm. The European rail pallet, 800 x 1200mm is, as Mr Swinburn emphasised, a dreadful size for ISO containers.

The rubber industry use pallets of 1,100 x 1,425mm for unit loads of rubber.

The moral is. . .

The moral for all exporters is to use pallets or unit loads compatible with the requirements and equipment available at the importing end.

What is the experience of companies which have made a serious effort to contain pallet losses?

Herbert Nettleship, group distribution manager, United Glass Ltd, said losses of pallets in his company had been reduced from 55 per cent to five per cent thanks to the introduction of a centralised recording system and the introduction of charges for pallets. United Glass moves 3 million pallets loads a year and repair 250,000 pallets, writing off 45,000 per year. The company's traffic movements require the use of 20,000 or more pallets daily.

It was revealed at the Kenilworth seminar, that the three largest glassware companies were considering the possibility of a new company to administer pallet control for the glassware industry. Already, there was a joint pallet collection system whereby participating firms collected each other's pallets and returned them to the owning firms without charge. The system was said to work very well.

Some background details of the British pallet-making industry were given by J. M. B. Mead, chairman of Tilgate Pallets Ltd. His own company makes pallets to 300 different specifications, with 20 different models in the popular 1,000 x 1,200mm size.

This relatively standardised pallet, he said, comprises about a half of all the pallets used in the UK.

Tilgate's pallet recovery company has a success rate of 85 per cent and the cost of recovery has barely increased in recent years. The company provides a full inspection and repair service and when a user company experiences a damage rate in excess of 15 per cent, Tilgate recommends the use of higher specification pallets.

Control vital

Tilgate is often asked to hire pallets to meet the seasonal needs of customers. In hiring situations, control is vital, said Mr Mead, with regular stock checks to determine the value of hiring. He stressed that a low return rate of pallets could disguise a normal scrap rate. Clearly, many pallet users economise excessively on pallet specifications, One certain fact is that the Health and Safety at Work etc, Act puts on all pallet users the responsibility for suitable purchase policies and for adequate maintenance arrangements for pallets. Non-returnable pallets have their place in some applications, though they present a disposable problem, particularly if the materials used are not readily combustible.

Pallets with a limited life, usable for several trips, need to be carefully inspected because structural failure can not only lead to heavy penalties from senders of goods but also may lead to actions from employees on the basis of a breach of safety

codes. 0 John Darker


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