← All guides

Pallet rent and late declarations: how the days add up

Why a late declaration costs money on a daily-hire pallet account, how to work out pallet-days, and what to change.

How daily hire works

On accounts with daily hire, rent is roughly the number of pallets on your balance times the number of days times the daily rate. A pallet stays on your balance until you declare it shipped or returned.

So a load of 24 pallets declared 6 days after it shipped adds 144 pallet-days of rent. At an example rate of $0.04 a day, that's $5.76 for one load; across hundreds of loads a month it adds up. Your contract sets the real rate; use the pallet rent calculator with yours.

Finding late declarations

Compare the ship date in your WMS with the date the declaration was entered at the pallet company. Many statements include both an effective date and an entered date.

PalletAudits lists each late declaration with the days late and the rent it added, and checks the pallet-days on the invoice against the pallet company's own activity.

Fixing it

Declare on the ship date. If declarations are batched weekly, move to daily, or have them sent automatically from the WMS.

Declare with the BOL number every time, so late and missing declarations are easy to spot.

More guides

General information, not advice about any specific contract. Your agreement with the pallet company sets the actual fees and deadlines.