Packing format
Exchange pallet or one way, and who pays
Under an exchange arrangement the pallet stays in a pool and never reaches the invoice: the receiver hands back an equivalent pallet at delivery and the account is kept in pallets. A one way pallet is bought, and its cost sits inside the price of the fruit whether or not anybody itemises it. Which one applies to a load from us is unsettled.
The figures
| What exchange means | A loaded pallet is delivered and an equivalent empty pallet is handed back on the spot |
|---|---|
| Who runs the open European pool | EPAL, whose exchange pool is built on the licensed EPAL Euro pallet |
| How a returned pallet is judged | Against EPAL's quality classification for the open exchange pool |
| Classes in that classification | New, A, B and C, plus unsorted pallets exchanged one for one |
| Who may repair a pallet back into the pool | Repairers licensed by EPAL, under external inspection |
| What a one way pallet leaves behind | A disposal cost at the receiving end |
| Our own arrangement | Not confirmed. No pallet terms have been agreed with the grower |
What it changes on an order
You take delivery at a site with no pallet stock
Exchange only works if somebody at your dock can produce an acceptable pallet within minutes of the vehicle arriving. Where that is not true, an exchange term on paper turns into a pallet debt in practice.
You are opening a route into a new country
Pools are dense in some markets and thin in others. A term that works between two established users can quietly become a one way movement that nobody priced, and the first invoice is where it shows.
You are comparing two delivered prices
One supplier may be selling you the wood and another lending it. That is a real difference per pallet, and it is invisible unless the enquiry asks for it, because neither of them will volunteer a line for packaging.
What this note does not settle
- This describes how the exchange system is set up, not how any particular trading pair operates it. Pallet terms are negotiated, and plenty of loads move on arrangements that match neither model cleanly.
- Condition judgement at the dock is where exchange arrangements actually fail, and no published criterion removes the argument. Agree who decides before you need somebody to decide.
- We have agreed no pallet terms, no incoterms and no carrier. Nothing here says which arrangement a load from us would run on.
Source: EPAL, the open pallet exchange pool, EPAL, quality and licensed repair
A container, or something you bought
The wood under the fruit is either borrowed or sold, and the two arrangements behave nothing alike. Inside an exchange system the pallet stays in a pool: the receiver hands back an equivalent pallet, no pallet appears on the invoice, and the accounting runs in pallets rather than in money. A one way pallet is a purchase. Its cost lands in the price of the fruit whether or not anybody itemises it.
Which of the two you are on decides what happens in your own yard. Exchange means holding a stock of acceptable pallets, having somewhere to keep them, and having somebody at the dock qualified to judge whether what is being handed over is fit to go back into the pool. A one way pallet means disposal, and disposal is a cost that arrives quietly at the wrong end of the transaction.
The system stops where the system stops
Pallet pools work where both ends belong to them. Ship into a customer without an account, into a trade that does not exchange, or into a region where the pool is thin, and the exchange quietly turns into a one way movement nobody priced. First deliveries into a new country are where this surfaces.
The judgement at the dock is the other surprise. A pallet handed back has to meet the pool's condition rules, and one rejected there becomes a debit note or a pallet account that never balances. Agree in writing which system a load runs on, who supplies the wood and what happens to it, before the first vehicle is booked.
Talk to the grower
Tell us the variety, the sizes and the delivery week you need. You get a delivered price and what we can commit to in writing, from the person who picks the fruit.
The grower handles enquiries. Response times are still to be confirmed.