Pallets

[dilligaf]

We have one big acct that forklifts pallets into the back of a feeder and the feeder comes to our center and is unloaded by hand. I don't know what they do with the pallets. I'm guessing they get left in the feeder and returned to the cust.

Oak pallets also make great interior wall siding if you take the time to pick through the pallets to get the better pieces. I have seen a wall done in a cross hatch pattern. It turned out great.

 

[mattwtrs]

pallets? where, how and why would UPS have pallets? Are they coming from large pickup accts that are bulk loaded into our trailers? I can't say I ever dealt with pallets at UPS. So does this mean UPS also has forklifts and pallet jacks?

Rod, you must have really had a sheltered life at Uncle Buster! Back in the 80's & 90's when the business grew any center that had CPU trailers got pallet jacks if they did not have an extendo for unloading p/u's on the local sort. Moving the pallets to unload them sure beat setting up T stands & rollers.

Most CPU accounts had their packages on pallets so it only made sense to load 6-8 pallets instead of hand loading 400 pkgs. Some customers requested we exchange pallets which we did.

When my center got the P1000's some drivers had customers make pallets that would fit between the wheel wells to make loading p/u's easier!

 

[raceanoncr]

It's my understanding the wood that pallets are made of is soaked in a chemical that repels termites.
I think it is called creosote (my spelling may be wrong).
When burned, this chemical emits a toxic gas that is dangerous to inhale.
You might want to consider this when using your fireplace, and this wood, during the holiday season.

Thanx for info Trick. Just bought a load for the EX to use in her fireplace! Buh, bye, alimony!!!!

 

[rod]

Rod, you must have really had a sheltered life at Uncle Buster! quote]


My center had 22-25 delivery drivers and 1 nighttime feeder route that they eventually got rid of. The 1st part of my career we shared a center manager with another center and he lived in that town so we only saw him maybe 2-3 times a week- never on Mondays or Fridays. We had a "lead driver" that got paid 10 cents an hour more than regular drivers to be in charge of wrapping up the "drivers sort" and getting us out of the building. Now (after going to a pre-load sort about 15 years ago) it still has about the same amount of drivers but they also have a full time center manager, 2 fulltime sups and a couple parttime sups. They call that "progress"

 

[UPSNewbie]

I got my ass chewed for leaving a couple of pallets in the feeder. Turns out it was a "package."

 

[trickpony1]

Thanx for info Trick. Just bought a load for the EX to use in her fireplace! Buh, bye, alimony!!!!

Apparently my info is wrong.
Those much wiser than I will ever be have decreed that not all pallets are treated with this chemical.
I must have made this info up during one of my idle moments. (sarcasm)
So burn those pallets right up.

 

[MonavieLeaker]

Does anyone know what UPS does with all the pallets they get? Do they sell them? Seems like an easy way to make some extra cash.

We load over top of them

 

[705red]

Now it makes sense----------all that big city stuff easily confuses me. Thanks

We actually have indoor plumbing and moving belts in the ups buildings now!

And we dont use horse and buggies anymore either!

 

[brownrodster]

Central Pickup which was later changed to Trailer Pickup and Delivery. These centers are usually in the larger hubs and end in an 8, For instance, the SLIC for Atlanta Hub is 3039 and Atlanta TDP is 3038.
These TDP drivers will take an empty trailer out and swap a full one which is brought back to the Twilight/Metro sort of the hub (hub equivalent of a small center's reload operation).
Customers will load up pallets (usually shrink wrapped) and then move them onto these trailers. These trailers are dock height flat bed trailers (typically 40 ft - Q). Probably, you are use to drop-frame trailers which we use to feed packages from one UPS location to another UPS locations.

my smallish center has these cpu routes. the feeders who go out and deliver trailer loads to huge companies (with a diad) then do pickups... I remember unloading those feeders after pickups. Tons of shrink wrap on every pallot. Getting through the shrink wrap was harder than unloading the trailers.

Anyways, I think it's the shifter who takes the pallots out of these trailers and puts them in a pile out back. Then every once in a while some truck comes by and takes them. I've seen the guy take them a few times. I do not know any details about it however.

 

[UpstateNYUPSer(Ret)]

We have many large shippers in our center so there is a constant flow of pallets going back and forth. Pallets that have become damaged or can no longer be used are piled on the side of our bldg and a guy with a white P/U comes by, gathers them up and drives away. I think he has an outdoor wood boiler and uses the wood for fuel and I also think that he takes them for free rather than UPS having to pay to have them hauled away but I am not sure about that.

The shrink wrap may be a pain to deal with but the alternative would be much worse IMO.

 

[raceanoncr]

a guy with a white P/U comes by, gathers them up and drives away.
.

It's the Pallet Fairy

 

[mattwtrs]

The shrink wrap may be a pain to deal with but the alternative would be much worse IMO.

One of the CPU drivers was cleaning a trailer when the customer counter clerk saw all the shrink wrap and told him to bring it in to the rewrap area, the clerk used it for padding on rewaps. He also gave it to counter customers that needed packing to protect the contents of their packages.

Good way to recycle the stuff!

 

[gandydancer]

One of the CPU drivers was cleaning a trailer when the customer counter clerk saw all the shrink wrap and told him to bring it in to the rewrap area, the clerk used it for padding on rewaps. He also gave it to counter customers that needed packing to protect the contents of their packages.

Good way to recycle the stuff!

I do the same thing when I do retapes as a sweeper on the load wall. Too damn many clueless customers try to ship things rattling around in nearly empty boxes that simply won't hold together. A good on-belt box is an overstuffed box...and gobs of pallet wrap is even better than folded cardboard in making a container that will hold a tape job. (Plastic dog fewmet -"peanuts"- is worse than useless.)

We're supposed to have a feeder carwash guy who cleans pallets and pallet wrap out of our CPU trailers on a 3am-12 noon shift, and our feeder manager claims he doesn't need more manpower to get that done. Except it ain't gettin' done and when I come in at 6pm I'm finding trailers with a dozen or more pallets, plus gobs of palletwap, set up on the load walls. And they also run out of clean trailers during the Twi and Night Hub and have to transfer CPU trailers directly from the unload to the load walls whether they want to or not. As the new Twi safety co-chair I'm emailing the feeder manager daily over that (I think he needs to put his carwash guy on a Twi-Night shift, and maybe needs to add hours instead of stealing the guy away from his supposed job to do yard work...) and hope to eventually embarass him into not putting up dirty trailers.

$10@ sounds a bit pricy, but I know there's a standard "two-way" pallet design and size that fetches the best price. I think there's only one big account that gets its pallets back, but whether we sell or give away the other ones I don't know.

And I'm pretty sure creosote is only for railroad ties and docks. More usually ground-contact wood is pressure trated with a poisonous gas in a process that leaves a green tinge and lots of little cuts in the surface of the wood. Pallet wood is perfectly safe to burn if it's not painted, and I use it in my fireplace all the time. Not from UPS, tho. Plenty thrown out by UCSF across the street, inluding purpose-built machinery pallets with lots of 4 x 4's and 4 x 6's.

 

[ikoi62]

about 10 years ago we just use to throw them away or fill a 24 footer and take them to a customer.
then one of the drivers suggested that we sell them to someone and give the profits to united way. as far as i know they still do that . the guy who comes to our place for the pallets takes a 48 foot trailer 90% full every other day from our building.

 

[satellitedriver]

We have many large shippers in our center so there is a constant flow of pallets going back and forth. Pallets that have become damaged or can no longer be used are piled on the side of our bldg and a guy with a white P/U comes by, gathers them up and drives away. I think he has an outdoor wood boiler and uses the wood for fuel and I also think that he takes them for free rather than UPS having to pay to have them hauled away but I am not sure about that.

The shrink wrap may be a pain to deal with but the alternative would be much worse IMO.

I have a "pallet man" on my route. He scrounges behind WalMart, grocery stores ect...., and he can load about 25 broken pallets in his old pickup truck. He sells them to a company for $3.00 a pop, that company rebuilds them and resells them.
All kinds of ways to make money out there.

 

[thebrownbox]

I don't know if other center's get them but I hate the plastic pallets with the open mesh look.. they seem to break off easy..

Also same for the pressed wood type as well.

 

[outta hours]

At my location we have a crew of 4 non UPS people who unload all of the pallets each morning. They load in into to two 48 footers that are then hauled away. Not sure who gets the money for that.