How to Guide: Shipping Pallets to Austria Professionally

Austria has remained a significant trading partner with the UK even following the UK’s departure from the European Union. With a relatively high GDP and a number of high-tech industries, Austria remains a country in which many British exporting firms would like to maintain customers. Therefore, the ability to send a pallet to Austria not just quickly but cost-effectively, too, is high on the list of priorities for numerous British exporters. What do you need to know about shipping pallets to Austria and what is the best way to do so reliably?

Which Sorts of Pallets to Use?

Some British exporters worry about using UK pallets when sending commercial goods to Austria because they are slightly larger than Euro pallets. Unless your order is going to be delivered to a fully automated warehouse, the sort that many distribution hubs use, UK pallets are likely to be fine. That’s good to know if you are fulfilling your order on a door-to-door basis rather than simply sending your pallet to Austria to a central distribution centre in Vienna, Innsbruck or Graz, for example. The majority of Austrian companies won’t find UK pallets a problem to handle on arrival.

Booking Express Delivery Services

According to Barrington Freight, a professional international freight and logistics firm based in Essex, express courier services are now commonplace between the UK and Austria. Many Austrian firms want goods to arrive in great condition and just as quickly as had they ordered from a firm in another EU member state. Therefore, forward-thinking British exporters turn to express couriers to fulfil their demands swiftly. 

Typically, sending a pallet to Austria fast will mean a van is used. The quickest way is to have two drivers onboard so one can take over the driving when the other is forced to take a break. If so, it is possible to get to the Austrian border from northern France in just over 12 hours non-stop. Of course, you still need to monitor the roads in France, Belgium and Germany to ensure potential delays are avoided en route.

Economical Ways to Send a Pallet to Austria

If you are shipping a pallet to Austria with less urgency, then there is a more cost-effective option you can use. Many freight forwarding firms offer palletised groupage rates. With this sort of service, your pallet or pallets will be grouped with others bound for Austria and nearby locations in Liechtenstein, southern Germany and even Slovenia. A lorry will be loaded with all of the palletised consignments and sent to Europe via Hook of Holland, Dunkirk or another convenient port. 

Once customs clearances have been conducted, the lorry driver will make multi-drop deliveries of the pallets to each location. The service takes longer, of course, but is much less expensive per pallet given the shared overheads. Note that groupage shipments can be sent to any location in Austria, not just the big cities but more out-of-the-way places, too, such as Soelden, Spielberg, Parndorf and Eggenburg, for instance.