Should I Hire Or Lease My Forklifts?

If you need forklifts for your business, it is important to consider your options. Heavy handling equipment is expensive to buy or hire and run. If you are not careful, you can end up wasting thousands of pounds every year. On the other hand, if you choose the right option you can save your business thousands.

Perhaps the most important decision is whether to buy or lease your forklift trucks.

Consider the cost of purchasing a new truck

For the vast majority of businesses, buying their forklift trucks is not an option many simply do not have sufficient cash in the bank to do so. However, bear in mind that it is possible to buy forklift trucks using a loan agreement.

Buying a truck is really only more cost effective if you already have the money to buy the truck and are sure you will be using it for many years. Forklift trucks hold their value better than a car or van, but they do still depreciate.

Forklift trucks are expensive. Once you have bought them they need to be regularly serviced and maintained, which can also work out expensive.

Consider maintenance costs

In the past, you would have needed your own in house engineers to do the servicing. Today, someforklift-leasing companies do the maintenance for firms that own their trucks, so not having your own engineers is not necessarily a barrier to buying and running your own forklift trucks.

Most forklift dealers and lease companies know how important choice is to their customers. The best firms sell new and used trucks as well as lease them out. Speaking to a few leasing firms is the quickest and easiest way of establishing the costs of each option. Just resist the temptation to sign an agreement before you have completed your research.