CHEP and PECO pallets

• Blue. CHEP pallets are painted blue.
• Red. PECO pallets are painted red.
• A stamped or branded logo. Pooled pallets carry the pooler’s name on the blocks or boards.
• Uniform build. Pooled pallets are made to one standard, so a stack of them looks identical.

1. StopDo not add it to a sell load. It is not yours to sell.
2. Set it asideKeep it dry and apart from the rest so the owner can collect it.
3. Call the poolerThe owner has a collection process and will arrange it.
4. Tell usWhen you send a count, say how many pooled pallets are in the pile.

On our sites’ stripe key, blue and red mean pooled. The grades use other colors, so a stack painted for sorting never looks like a pallet that belongs to someone else. See the grades key.

People assume a pallet is theirs because it arrived at their dock. It is not. Receiving pooled pallets on inbound freight does not transfer ownership. If your stack includes some, the safe course is to sort them out before you count.

A pooling company buys a large fleet of identical pallets and rents them to shippers. The shipper sends goods on a pooled pallet, the receiver unloads it, and the pooler collects it for the next job. Because the pallets circulate, they stay in good condition and every dock knows the dimensions, which is why grocery and consumer goods chains favor them.

The system only works if the pallets come back. A pallet that stops at a dock and gets sold on is a lost asset, and poolers audit accordingly. When we set blue and red pallets aside, we are protecting the person who sent them as much as ourselves.

• Stack pooled pallets apart from owned stock as they arrive, so they never join the sell pile.
• Keep a log of who delivered them, since the pooler will ask.
• Schedule the collection with the pooler before the stack grows.
• Count them in the request so we know the true size of the pile.

Piles that include pooled pallets are common because freight from several shippers arrives on the same dock. Pull the blue and red ones out when you count, and tell us how many you found. We will note them in the reply and leave them for the owner.

Pooled pallets wander. A carrier picks one up by mistake, a receiver keeps one for a shelf, a shipper forgets to send one back. Poolers know this and run recovery programs, which is why a stray pallet is usually welcome back and rarely a dispute. Ask the company how it wants them returned, and whether it will collect from your address.

Do not repaint a pooled pallet, cut it up or pass it to a recycler. Poolers treat all three as theft of equipment.

• Does the freight arrive on pooled pallets?
• Who is responsible for returning them?
• How soon must they go back?
• Is there a deposit?

Set the pallet aside, photograph the markings and notify the carrier or the pooling company. Moving the pallet into a general pile is the quickest way to create a dispute about who owns it.

Pooling companies own their fleets, rent them to shippers and collect them again from receivers. Their leased equipment is meant to cycle through repairs, never to be sold, which is why a stray pallet is treated as misplaced property.

Record the date, quantity, location and serial or stencil text, then keep that note with the photographs until the owner collects or confirms release.

Can I sell a CHEP pallet?

No. CHEP pallets are blue and belong to the pooling company.

Who owns red pallets?

PECO, a pooling company. Ask them to collect.

Why do poolers audit?

A pallet that leaves the pool is a lost asset, so poolers track their fleets and ask where pallets went.