A remittance, a kill sheet and a nagging feeling
Two weeks after a load of finished cattle went to the abattoir, a remittance lands with a figure that seems a bit light. The kill sheet is attached as a PDF, one line per carcase: tag, weight, conformation and fat class, price per kilo, any deductions, and a total. You sent twelve. You check, and there are twelve lines. The total goes into the accounts and you move on.
What you did not check is whether each line matches the animal you think it is, whether the grid used is the one you agreed, whether the deduction on line seven is for something you recognise, and whether the weights look right for those particular animals. For lambs, with a sheet of forty or fifty lines and batch groupings, checking properly is harder still.
Why kill sheets go unchecked
The honest answer is that nobody has time, and the kill sheet is written in the abattoir's terms, not yours.
- Kill sheets arrive as PDFs or paper with layouts that change between buyers and sometimes between months.
- The price grid, bonuses and penalties agreed on the phone or in a contract are not written next to the sheet.
- Your own record of what was loaded is in the movement paperwork, the herd register or a note, not in one place with the sale.
- Deductions such as levies, transport, condemned parts or out-of-spec penalties are shown as codes or short labels.
- Weights and grades mean little without knowing how that animal performed before it left.
If you sell to more than one abattoir or through a producer group, each has its own format, its own grid and its own habits, so there is no single way to check them all by eye.
The cost of not looking closely
Most kill sheets are correct. The trouble is that you cannot tell which ones are not unless you check them all. A wrong grid, a carcase attributed to the wrong supplier, a deduction applied twice or a missing animal are all things that can happen in any busy business, and they tend to be spotted by whoever is looking.
Beyond getting paid correctly, the kill sheet is some of the most useful data a livestock farm receives. Carcase weight, conformation and fat class, set against breed, sire, age and feeding, tell you what is working. When the sheets sit in an email folder, that information is lost.
And there is the everyday time cost. When the accountant asks why sales for a month are lower than expected, someone has to dig out the sheets and the load lists and work it out.
What we build to check every sheet
What we build is a kill sheet checker that reads each abattoir's paperwork, matches it to what you sent and shows you only the lines that need a look.
- Kill sheets and remittances arrive by email into a dedicated inbox, or you forward them. The system reads each format, including PDFs, and pulls out tag, weight, grade, price and each deduction.
- Each consignment is matched to your load list: the animals recorded as moved off to that abattoir on that date, from your movement log or register.
- Each line is checked against the price grid you enter for that buyer, including bonuses and penalties by grade and weight band, and against the deductions you expect.
- Missing animals, animals on the sheet you did not send, price differences, unexpected deductions and totals that do not add up are all flagged in a short exceptions list.
- Matched results are stored against each animal, so carcase data sits next to its breed, sire, age and group in one place.
- Payments are matched to bank lines, and the sale can be posted to Xero, QuickBooks or Sage with the right split of income and deductions, if you want that.
| What the checker flags | Typical reason to look |
|---|---|
| Tag on sheet not in your load list | Mix-up at the abattoir or a recording error on your side |
| Animal loaded but no line on the sheet | Carcase attributed elsewhere, or condemned |
| Price per kilo off your grid | Wrong grid applied, or a grid change you were not told about |
| Deduction you do not recognise | New charge, duplicate, or an error |
| Weight far from expectations for that group | Worth asking about, or a recording mistake |
After the next load goes
The load of twelve cattle leaves on Monday and the movement log records the tags. Ten days later the kill sheet arrives by email. By the time you open it, it has been read and matched: eleven lines are fine, one carcase has a penalty for a fat class you do not recognise on that animal. You ring the buyer with the tag number and the grid in front of you.
At the end of the year you can look at every animal sold deadweight, by breed or sire, with weight and grade, without opening a single PDF.
Is this how your kill sheets are handled?
- You check the total on the remittance but rarely each line.
- You sell to more than one abattoir or through a group, each with its own paperwork.
- The price grid you agreed is not written down next to the sheets.
- Carcase results never make it back into your herd or flock records.
- You have had a query about a missing or wrongly graded animal and struggled to find the paperwork.