Market note

What a Depot Actually Charges For

September 17, 2026

A depot invoice is rarely one line, and the line people argue about is almost never the one that moved the total. Storage per day is visible and easy to compare; the lifts, the survey and the repair approval sit around it and usually decide what the operation cost. Knowing which line is which is the difference between negotiating a rate and negotiating a bill.

At a glance

Key takeaways

Storage per day is the visible line; lifts, survey and repair approval usually decide the total.
A storage rate describes the yard, not the container — land, occupancy and direction of trade set it.
The repair approval loop costs more than the repair on anything minor, because the unit keeps accruing storage while it waits.
Lease free days cover the lease, not the depot: a unit inside its free days can still be accruing yard storage.

Container hardware, inspection gauges, a cleaning brush and blank tags on a metal workbench

What a depot invoices, line by line

Gate-in and gate-out. Every movement across the gate is an event, and each event is charged. The names vary — lift on, lift off, handling in, handling out — but the substance is a crane or reach stacker moving a box and a clerk recording it. Two movements minimum per stay, one at each end.

Storage, per day, per unit. The line everyone compares. It starts when the unit is gated in and stops when it is gated out, and it does not care whether the box is full, empty, sold or waiting for a decision.

Survey. An inspection against a standard — usually IICL criteria or a cargo-worthy assessment. Charged per unit, and it is what produces the condition record everything else is argued against.

Cleaning. Sweeping, washing, odour treatment, or removal of a previous cargo's residue. Quoted per unit and sometimes per problem.

Repair. An estimate first, then the work if it is approved. The estimate itself is often chargeable, and the approval step is where days go missing while storage keeps running.

Reefer-specific. Pre-trip inspection, plugging in, monitoring, and power. A reefer sitting in a yard consumes electricity, and someone is billed for it.

Why the same box costs more to keep in one port than another

Storage rates are not a reflection of the container. They are a reflection of the yard.

Land. A depot in a constrained urban port pays for every square metre it occupies. A depot on cheap land two hours inland does not. That difference reaches the invoice before anything operational does.

Yard occupancy. A depot at ninety per cent full prices storage to discourage long stays; a depot at forty per cent prices it to attract volume. The same operator can quote differently in the same month for that reason alone.

Direction of trade. A port that imports more than it exports accumulates empties, so its yards fill and its storage prices harden — sometimes to the point of refusing units altogether. A port that exports more runs short, and its depots compete for stock. This is the same mechanism that sets availability, seen from the cost side.

Who the depot works for. A depot dedicated to a shipping line's equipment treats third-party boxes as spare capacity and prices them accordingly. An independent depot sells storage as its product. Neither is better; they are different counterparties.

Who pays which line

With carrier equipment, most of these charges sit inside the carrier's tariff and surface as demurrage and detention when time runs out. You see two numbers and a clock.

With shipper-owned equipment, you see the depot's actual lines, and you pay them directly or through whoever holds the depot relationship. That is more invoice detail and more control: a charge you can see is a charge you can question, schedule around, or avoid by moving the unit sooner.

The free-day allowance in a lease sits on top of this, and it covers the lease, not the depot. A unit inside its free days can still be accruing storage at the depot if nobody moved it.

What moves the bill, and it is not the rate

Dwell time. Days are the multiplier on every per-day line. A negotiation that wins a lower daily rate and loses a week is a negotiation lost.

Condition at gate-in. An undocumented handover at origin becomes a disputed repair estimate at destination. The survey at gate-out is what makes the survey at gate-in arguable.

The approval loop. A repair estimate waiting for a decision is a unit sitting in a yard at full storage. The delay costs more than the repair on anything minor.

Returning to the wrong place. A drop-off location that suits the operator and one that suits you are rarely the same yard, and the gap is priced — in trucking, in lifts, and sometimes in a refusal at the gate.

What to ask before you agree a depot

Which movements are chargeable and how many are expected for this operation. When the storage clock starts and what stops it. Whether a survey is included or billed per unit. Who approves repairs, and within how long. Whether the depot will accept the unit back, in the condition it will realistically be in, on the date you expect. And whether the quoted rate holds if the unit stays twice as long as planned — because that is the case that decides whether the quote was useful.

Questions

Frequently asked questions

Gate movements in and out, storage per day per unit, survey against a condition standard, cleaning, and repair once an estimate is approved. Reefers add pre-trip inspection, plugging in and power. Which lines apply depends on the operation, not on the container.

Because storage prices the yard. Land cost, how full the yard already is, and whether the port imports more than it exports all move the rate before anything about the container does. A port accumulating empties hardens its storage pricing or stops accepting units; a port running short competes for stock.

Whoever holds the depot relationship, directly. That is more invoice detail than a carrier tariff shows, and more control: a visible charge can be questioned, scheduled around, or avoided by moving the unit sooner.

Shorten dwell time before negotiating rates, document condition at both gate events, and decide repair approvals the same day the estimate arrives. Agree the return location in writing before the unit is released — a refusal at the gate is the most expensive outcome on the list.