Rented equipment: stop paying for machines nobody is using
The rental invoice for a furniture store fit-out shows a scissor lift for the second month running. The ceiling grid it came for was finished five weeks ago. The foreman kept it in case the sprinkler fitters needed it, and they used it on two days.
Keep one register of every rented machine with the date it should come off rent, check its use every week, and call it off the day its work is done. Rent is charged by the day, week or month whether the machine works or not, so an idle lift costs as much as a busy one. Machines stay because whoever ordered one rarely owns its return, and keeping it feels safer than booking it again. Idle time that another party caused is a different record: standby and idle time.
The rental register
- Register every machine on arrival: type and size, unit number, supplier, rates, on-rent date, the activity it serves, who ordered it and its cost code.
- Set the off-rent date when you order, from the look-ahead, and ask the supplier when rent stops: at your call, at pickup or back at the yard.
- Record use every day: each unit's hours, or "not used", in the daily report. Two or three idle days in a row make it a candidate to call off.
- Price "just in case" before agreeing to it: the rent until the next real need, against a fresh rental for those days with delivery and pickup.
- Call it off the day it is done, and record the supplier's reference, the date and the time. Leave it where the truck can reach it, cleaned and charged or fuelled as the agreement requires, and photograph it.
- Check every invoice against the register, and dispute any rent after a call-off by quoting the reference. Go through the register with the foremen each week.
Common mistakes
- Letting only the person who ordered a machine know it is on site.
- Calling a machine off by voicemail, or through the driver, with no reference.
- Paying rental invoices without checking the dates.
- Keeping a machine for a need that is not in the look-ahead.
Action list
This Friday
- List every rented machine with its unit number and rates
- Give each one a planned off-rent date
- Mark any unit with no hours this week
- Call off what is done and record the reference
- Match the last invoice against the register
- Price the next "just in case" before agreeing to it
Check your understanding
A telehandler rents for $1,400 a week, and returning it now and bringing it back later would cost $500 in total. The work that needs it stops for two weeks. Do you keep it?
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