Forklift compliance for warehouses that never stop.
Three shifts, agency peaks, reach trucks in narrow aisles and racking that takes a knock a week. Warehousing is where the daily check matters most, and where paper systems fail first.
What goes wrong in warehousing & distribution
One check, three shifts
HSE guidance expects a pre-use check per shift, not per day. A paper book signed at 06:00 says nothing about the truck the night shift takes over at 22:00.
Agency operators at peak
Christmas peak doubles the operator pool. Licence categories and expiry dates are exactly what slips when thirty new starters arrive in a fortnight.
Racking strikes go unreported
Impact damage to racking and trucks is routinely unlogged on paper. Untracked damage compounds until it becomes a collapse or a failed fork.
Asset360 on the ground
The 24/7 RDC running three shifts
The situation
A regional distribution centre runs 40 trucks around the clock. The day shift's paper checks exist; nights are patchy; nobody can say which truck was checked when the auditor asks.
With Asset360
Every operator scans the truck at shift start: the record is per-shift, time-stamped and attributed. The dashboard shows live completion by shift, so a missed check is visible at 22:15, not at year-end audit.
Peak-season agency staff
The situation
Thirty agency operators join for peak. Two have lapsed licences and one is only rated for counterbalance but gets put on a reach truck.
With Asset360
PIN authorisation blocks lapsed licences and wrong truck categories at the point of use. The agency operators who are cleared work immediately; the ones who aren't never get the keys.
The racking strike that finally gets logged
The situation
A truck clips an upright at 03:00. On paper, nothing happens: the damage is found weeks later during a racking inspection.
With Asset360
The operator fails the check item, photographs the damage, and a work order is raised before the shift ends. The full history sits on the truck's record for the insurer and the racking inspector.
Warehousing & distribution: common questions
Does each shift need its own forklift check?
Yes. HSE guidance expects a pre-use check before each shift or first use, not one check per calendar day. Asset360 records checks per operator per shift, so a three-shift operation shows three records per truck per day.
How do you handle agency and temporary operators?
Each operator has a record with accreditation (RTITB, ITSSAR, AITT), licence categories and expiry. A lapsed licence or wrong truck category is blocked at PIN entry, before the check starts, before the truck moves.
Do reach trucks and VNA trucks get different checklists?
Yes. Checklists are class-aware and fuel-type-aware: reach trucks get their additional items automatically, and electric trucks get battery checks instead of diesel or LPG items.
General guidance, not legal advice. See our plain-English guides to PUWER, LOLER and the daily forklift check.
See it on your own fleet.
A 20-minute demo set up with your trucks, including the checks and evidence that matter in warehousing & distribution.