Plan for the peaks. Cold chain volumes climb before Christmas and Easter, through summer for drinks and frozen desserts, and around major promotions from the big retailers. The time to build the casual pool is a few weeks before the peak, so each worker has done your induction and a few shifts before the busiest weeks. Our guide on warehouse peak season staffing covers how to size and time that pool.
Check the licence class, not just the licence. A High Risk Work Licence for forklifts comes in two classes. LF covers forklift trucks, including reach trucks. LO covers order picking forklift trucks where the operator lifts with the load. A worker with an LO cannot drive your reach trucks, and a worker with only an LF cannot run your order pickers. Ask the provider to sight the class that matches your trucks before the booking. The forklift licence classes guide explains the difference in detail.
Keep the same faces. Cold store work rewards workers who know your racking, your pick paths and your break routine. Ask the provider to rotate a small pool of workers who have already done your induction rather than sending new people each shift. Repeat workers pick faster in the cold and look after themselves better because they know the pattern.
Safety duties are shared. In Victoria the host is treated as the employer of a labour hire worker for health and safety purposes, so your cold work controls, break pattern and induction apply to casual workers in the same way as to your own staff. The provider must also be satisfied the site is safe before placing anyone. Our guide on host employer health and safety duties sets out how the two sides split the work.
Casual employment and the award. Cold store work is directed, rostered and supervised by the host, so we engage pickers, packers, storepersons and forklift operators as casual employees on our payroll under the relevant award, with WorkCover and superannuation from the first shift. Where a regulated labour hire arrangement order applies, our guide on same job same pay explains what it means for the rate.
Where the work is. Melbourne's cold storage clusters sit in the west around Truganina, Laverton North and Derrimut, in the north around Campbellfield and Somerton and around Epping, near the wholesale market, and in the south east around Dandenong South and Keysborough and Braeside. We supply warehouse staff and forklift operators across all three, and hold Victorian Labour Hire Licence VICLHL11535.
