When warehouse and logistics teams make forklift procurement decisions, many of them only focus on upfront purchase price, ignoring the long-term running cost that takes up over 70% of the total expenditure in the whole equipment life cycle. A comprehensive, scientific assessment on forklift running costs can effectively avoid unexpected extra expenditure and optimize the overall operation budget of the site.

The first core factor you need to evaluate is daily energy consumption cost. For electric forklifts, this part accounts for the largest proportion of the total running cost. You need to combine actual working conditions including daily working hours, average load weight, operation route length and local peak-valley electricity price policy for calculation. Arranging charging process at low electricity price period can effectively cut down the overall energy expenditure without affecting normal operation.

The second key factor is daily maintenance cost. Different from internal combustion forklifts with complex fuel, oil supply and exhaust systems, high quality electric forklifts have much fewer wearing parts that need regular replacement. You can refer to the official recommended maintenance cycle to calculate the annual maintenance budget, including the cost of vulnerable parts such as tires, brake pads and hydraulic oil, as well as related labor cost.

The third non-negligible factor is implicit compliance cost. Many regions have put forward strict emission control requirements for off-road mobile machinery working in factory areas. Traditional internal combustion forklifts need to bear extra expenses on emission inspection, transformation and related environmental protection permits, while zero-emission electric forklifts do not need to pay these additional costs at all. Lower operation noise of electric forklifts also helps improve working environment and reduce potential hidden management cost.

The last important factor to take into consideration is residual value at the end of service life. High quality electric forklifts equipped with long cycle life power batteries have much higher residual value after reaching the end of design service life, which can further average down the running cost per year during the whole usage period.

As Jianshu New Energy, we focus on BYD electric forklifts and have rich experience in matching cost evaluation for different operation conditions. If you need a customized full life cycle forklift running cost assessment scheme, you can send your consultation email to [email protected] for exclusive professional support.