Warehouse hiring fails in predictable ways — someone who cannot do the hours, cannot reach the site at 6am, or has a forklift ticket that expired. These questions surface all three before the first shift.
Which shift pattern suits you — days, nights, or rotating?
Rotating shifts are where most warehouse hires come apart. Someone who says plainly that nights do not work for them has done you a favour.
How would you get here for a 6am start?
Ask about the earliest shift specifically. Plenty of journeys that work at 9am do not exist at 5:30.
What equipment are you certified on, and when does it expire?
Counterbalance, reach truck, pallet jack, order picker. The expiry date is the half of the question people forget to ask.
What is the heaviest thing you lifted regularly in your last job?
“Regularly” is the operative word. A one-off is not a working day.
Walk me through what you check before signing off a pallet.
The best discriminator on this list. Someone who has actually done the work describes a sequence; someone who has not describes an attitude.
Have you worked to a pick rate before? What was it?
Not a pass-fail. It tells you whether targets will be a shock.
What do you do when a location is empty but the system says there is stock?
Tests whether they escalate, improvise or stop. All three can be right — you are listening for whether they have met the situation at all.
Have you used a scanner or WMS? Which one?
A name is worth more than a yes. It also tells you how much training the first week needs.
Is there anything about the role as described that would not work for you?
Invites the objection rather than discovering it in week two.
Use these without us
Copy any of the questions above into whatever you already use — they work on paper, over the phone, or in a text message. They are here because they are the ones that decide an hourly hire, not because they are ours.
If you would rather not collect the answers by hand, make a screening link: paste the job, keep these questions or write your own, and applicants answer on their phone. The answers come to your inbox and your reply goes straight to them. Free, no account, no card.
