Pallets and Fixtures
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Wikipedia-Article "Pallets"
- For the fictional town in the Pokémon series of games, named after an artist's palette, see Pallet Town.
A pallet is a flat transport structure made of wood or plastic (and in a few cases metal and paper) which can support a variety of goods in a stable fashion while being lifted by any mobile forklift device. The goods are placed on top of the pallet, and can be secured to it by straps or stretch-wrapped plastic film.
The most common ISO standard pallet measures 100 by 120 by 12 cm (slightly less than 40 inches by 48 inches by 5 inches). It weighs 15 to 21 kilograms empty. Most pallets can easily carry a load of 1,000 kg. The gradual advent of containers for the transport of nearly all goods has spurred the use of pallets because the containers always offer the clean, level surfaces needed to make pallet movement economical. The common ISO standard pallets also fit neatly into common ISO containers, which in turn fit neatly on container ships, trains and trucks.
In Europe an EUR standard pallet is commonly used and measures 80 by 120 by 12 cm. It is also called a CEN (Comité Européen de Normalisation - European Committee for Standardisation) pallet and it is used mainly for retail business, its size having been determined by the internal dimensions of trucks making deliveries from warehouses to retail establishments.
The cheapest pallets are made of softwood and are often considered as expendable, to be discarded as trash, along with other wrapping elements, upon reaching destination. These pallets are of a very simple construction which permits lifting from one of two opposite positions only. Slightly more complex hardwood pallets and most plastic pallets and metal pallets can be lifted from all four sides. These costlier pallets usually require a deposit and are returned to the sender or resold as used. Many of these "four way" pallets are color coded according to the loads they can bear, and other attributes. Paper pallets are often used for light loads, but engineered paper pallets are increasingly used for loads that compare with wood. Paper pallets are also used where recycling and easy disposal is important.
Businesses in retail or manufacturing with accommodations for loading and unloading standard sized pallets and internal procedures for taking advantages of the modular nature of the pallets usually have a distinct advantage over businesses which do not exploit standardized pallets. The exceptions are those establishments which sell small quantities of luxury items such as jewelry stores or extra large items such as cars. But even they are at least indirectly affected. For instance, the distributors of costume jewelry and like items would normally use pallets in their warehouses and car manufacturers have long ago integrated pallets in their logistics systems for transporting components from their suppliers and for moving around spare parts.
One of the greatest advantages of pallets is the number of ways they can be moved around. They can be hauled by forklift trucks of different sizes and they can also be transported by hand-pumped and hand-drawn jacks which require no more than muscle power, wherever a solid and even clean floor with enough room is available. A forklift truck often costs the same as a luxury automobile but a good reconditioned hand-drawn "pumper" jack can be gotten for a few hundred euros. The greatest investment is thus in the time it takes to plan for clearances and level surfaces in the construction of commercial or industrial buildings where the use of pallets could be economical.
Alternate uses
Old and discarded pallets can be used in pallet crafts.
They can also be used as a supply of free or nearly free firewood, although for safety reasons, the amount of softwood pallets burned in a fireplace should be limited in order to prevent Creosote buildup.
See also
Wikipedia-Article "Fixtures"
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| Property law |
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| Part of the common law series |
| Acquisition of property |
| Gift · Adverse possession · Deed |
| Lost, mislaid, and abandoned property |
| Bailment · Licence |
| Estates in land |
| Allodial title · Fee simple |
| Life estate · Fee tail · Future interest |
| Concurrent estate · Leasehold estate |
| Conveyancing of interests in land |
| Bona fide purchaser · Torrens title |
| Estoppel by deed · Quitclaim deed |
| Mortgage · Equitable conversion |
| Action to quiet title |
| Limiting control over future use |
| Restraint on alienation |
| Rule against perpetuities |
| Rule in Shelley's Case |
| Doctrine of worthier title |
| Nonpossessory interest in land |
| Easement · Profit |
| Covenant running with the land |
| Equitable servitude |
| Related topics |
| Fixtures · Waste · Partition |
| Riparian water rights |
| Lateral and subjacent support |
| Assignment · Nemo dat |
| Other areas of the common law |
| Contract law · Tort law |
| Wills and trusts |
| Criminal Law · Evidence |
In the law of real property, fixtures are anything that would otherwise be a chattel that have, by reason of incorporation or affixation, become permanently attached to the real property. At law, fixtures are treated in the same manner as real property, particularly under the law of security for debt. A classic case of a fixture is a building, which in the absence of language to the contrary in a contract of sale is considered to be part of the land itself and not a separate piece of property.
Some examples of a fixture are obvious - a piece of lumber sitting in a lumber yard is clearly a chattel. However, that same piece of lumber in a fence surrounding real property is considered to be real property itself. However, not all cases are as easy. Is, for example, a trailer home a piece of real property or a movable chattel? In many cases, it depends how permanently the trailer is attached to the land, such as whether the trailer has a foundation.
The discussion is not just academic, and can have real effects on creditors and mortgagors who assume that a given piece of property is a chattel or a piece of real property. In most jurisdictions, the law respecting the registration of security against debt, or proof that money has been lent on the collateral of property, is different for chattels than it is for real property. For example, in the province of Ontario, Canada, mortgages against real property must be registered in the county or region's land titles office. However, mortgages against chattels must be registered in the province-wide registry set up under the Personal Property Security Act.
In the case of a trailer home, whether it is a fixture or chattel has a bearing on whether a real property mortgage applies to the trailer. For example, most mortgages contain a clause that forbids the borrower from removing or demolishing fixtures on the property, which would lower the value of the security. However, there have been cases where lenders lend money based on the value of the trailer home on the property, where that trailer is later removed from the property. Similarly, a chattel mortgage granted to allow a person to purchase a trailer home could be lost if the trailer is later attached to real property.
The law regarding fixtures can also cause many problems with property held under a lease. Fixtures put in place by the tenant belong to the landlord if the tenant is evicted from the property. This is the case even if the fixture could have legally been removed by the tenant while the lease was in good standing. For example, a chandelier hung by the tenant may become the property of the landlord. Although this example is trivial, there have been cases where heavy equipment incorporated into a plant has been deemed to have become fixtures even though it was sold as chattels.
Because the value of fixtures can often exceed the value of the land on which they were affixed, lawsuits to determine whether a particular item is a chattel or a fixture are common. In one case in Canada, a provincial government argued that a huge earth dam was a chattel, as it was only held in place by gravity and not by any type of affixation (the claim was rejected).
In a sale of land, fixtures are treated as part of the land, and may not be removed or altered by the seller prior to the transfer of the land.
Trade fixtures
An important exception to the usual treatment of fixtures is the category of trade fixtures - chattels installed by a tenant on commercial property specifically for their use in a trade or business. These may always be removed by the tenant, so long as any damage to the structure caused by the removal is repaid or repaired.