How do I check how a landscape yard tracks stockpile volumes through the season?

A landscape yard’s inventory is heaped on the ground, so the method matters more than the number. Ask how piles are measured: by scale tickets, loader buckets, surveyed estimates or guesswork. Ask who does it and how often, and watch it happen if you can. A method that depends on one person’s eye is a risk.

Then follow the paper. Compare purchase records for incoming material with sales and scale tickets for outgoing material, and see whether the pile counts make sense. Ask about losses from weather, mixing, settling and theft, and how they are written off. Ask when the last full count took place and how far it differed from the books.

Check the yard itself. Are piles labelled and separated, or mixed? Is there a place for each material? Disorder suggests the tracking is loose. Finally, ask how the stock value reaches the financial statements and what the seller does at year end. Your accountant can test a few piles against the books, and can tell you how the yard’s inventory should be counted at closing. If the yard keeps a seasonal log of low points, ask to see it, because it shows when the stock runs thin.

Key takeaways

• Ask how piles are measured, how often and by whom.
• Match scale tickets and purchases against pile counts.
• Ask when the last full count was done and how it compared.