Field key
Whose pallet is this?
Answer one question at a time about the pallet in front of you. The key ends with who most likely owns it and whether it's yours to sell, recycle or return. Nothing is stored.
A plastic rental pallet. It goes back to its owner
Whoever's name is molded in. In the US, the best-known plastic pool is iGPS.
Pooled pallets are rented, not sold. The pool keeps ownership the whole time, so whoever ends up holding one can't sell, keep or grind it. The owner collects its strays through its own channel.
Don't grind or resell plastic pool pallets, even damaged ones. The owner recovers and recycles its own.
How the key decides
Ownership is marked on the pallet. Rental pools paint their pallets a solid color and stencil or mold their name on them, because they need strays to be recognized and sent back. A pallet with no paint and no owner mark is almost always a white-wood pallet, bought and sold outright. Construction and condition don't change who owns a pallet; they decide whether it's reused, repaired or recycled.
What the key won't tell you
It can't read a pallet you can't see, and colors fade. When a stencil names an owner, the stencil wins over the color. When in doubt, treat a painted pallet as someone else's and ask the company named on it.
All the outcomes
- A rental pallet. It goes back to its owner
- A rental pallet. It goes back to its owner
- A plastic rental pallet. It goes back to its owner
- Probably yours: a plain plastic pallet
- Someone else's pallet: contact the company on the mark
- A white-wood pallet, and it's yours to sell
- A repairable white-wood pallet, yours to sell or recycle
- Scrap: yours to recycle