Things not to do with your warehouse racking.

Pallet racks systems are used in warehouses to store their goods and optimize the stacking of materials for safe and easy access.  Warehouse racking involves coordination and logistics to keep business running smoothly and enhance the organization and storage capacity of your warehouse. However, most warehouse owners do not take the proper precautions to ensure they are2. u safe to use. One of the most important aspects of warehouse management is to ensure the safety of your employees and merchandise is to keep your racks in good condition, make sure to do regular inspections and take steps to prevent accidental damage. Without doing the proper due diligence, you may end up with costly warehouse racking problems. Here are things that you should not do with your racking systems:

1. Neglecting regular inspections: Rack inspection is a crucial part when it comes to your warehouse maintenance. Safety standards recommend that rack inspections should be carried out at least monthly by knowledgeable warehouse workers, and a thorough yearly inspection must be carried out by professionals with special knowledge and training about structural engineering concepts and the rack inspection process. The rack failure can be significant leading to damage to equipment and inventory to death. An inspector watches for damages and clearances that may cause potential fire hazards and also ensure the load capacity labels or plaques are correctly displayed on your racks so there is no overload. 
2. Using homemade repairs for your products: Homemade repairs can result in damage and instability. When repairing a racking system, it is crucial to know that these repairs are not suggested unless performed by a certified welder and supervised by an engineer approving the procedure. Many requirements should be considered and respected in order for performing home-made welding to work safely with minimal risk factors involved which makes them very difficult to be approved.
3. Not using proper protective devices: While racking systems are not designed to withstand strong forces caused by forklifts even if they are extremely efficient structures for supporting vertical loads. Installing racking protection is one of the great ways to reduce damage from forklifts however using inadequate racking protection equipment might give you a false sense of security and compromise warehouse safety.
4. Not training employees on how to operate pallet racks: A handbook with safety guidelines can give people an easy reference point for both employers and employees against accidents, claims or responsibilities in case something goes wrong. The importance of training employees in racking inspections cannot be overlooked. Without proper knowledge, staff’s efficiency and productivity levels may decrease and workers may make mistakes that could even cost them their life.
5. Overloading the racking: Overloading pallet racking systems can end up with them being broken or damaged. The most possible situation is that if the pallet racking system holds a load that surpasses its capability, it will be triggered to collapse onto a hard flooring.

Warehouse racking mistakes you need to avoid.

While racking systems is an efficient way to organize your warehouse, there are also few things you should avoid. Optimized pallet racks can increase the storage space and enhance warehouse productivity; however if you’re not careful, you could damage your materials or injure your employees. Here are few warehouse racking mistakes that you need to avoid:

1. Climbing pallet racks: Most of the warehouses and distribution centers have pallet racks that store products out of reach. To save time, workers tend to climb on the shelves to assemble or pick orders, however storage racks aren’t designed for climbing as it can not only result in racking collapse with loss of materials and costly damage. 
2. Incompatibility: One of the most common warehouse racking mistakes people make is purchasing racking that is not compatible with the business’s products, warehouse storage space, vehicles and existing pallets. When purchasing your racking systems, you will need to consider: the products you will be storing, size of the warehouse space available for racking and the type of forklift you are using. 
3. Overlooking maintenance, repairs and damages: A mistake that is usually overlooked is the maintenance, damages and repairs of pallet racking systems. Racking is subject to wear and tear such as improper loading, collisions with heavy forklifts and overloading, and if not looked after it can result in irreparable damage or safety issues. Sometimes there can be unnoticed resultant structural damage which could be noticed during inspecting pallet racks. When identified, damage repairs should not be delayed, get in touch with the supplier to assist in repairing it.
4. Ignoring height to depth ratio: It is crucial to take the correct height-to-depth ratio into account. Each pallet racking system must have a lower height to depth or 6:1 ratio. If the height to depth ratio is exceeded, then safety measures will be necessary to prevent overturning including, baseplates or overhead ties. 
5. Employing cheap or used pallet racks: Many warehouses and distribution centers prefer used second-hand pallet racking systems as they are much more affordable than a new one.  However not all second-hand pallet racking suppliers can be trusted for quality used racking systems. There could also be underlying issues such as internal rust, corrosion, and more which can incur unnecessary high repair costs to replace faulty racking or fix damage to inventory.