3PLPricingBenchmark,Australia2026

An Australian 3PL invoice typically has six line items. Inbound receiving: a per-unit fee for receipting stock into the warehouse, usually $0.20 to $0.70 per unit. Storage: a per-location-per-month fee, typically $4 to $10 per pallet, or equivalent rates for shelf or bin locations scaled by volume. Pick and pack: a per-order fee for assembling and packing one order, usually $2.50 to $6.00 for single-item orders, with per-additional-item fees of $0.30 to $0.80. Packaging consumables: satchels, boxes, void fill, tape, printed labels. Returns processing: $3 to $10 per returned unit depending on inspection complexity. Postage and carrier fees: passed through at cost plus a margin, usually 5 to 15%.

On top of these per-event charges, many 3PLs add recurring fixed fees. Account management fees ($150 to $500 per month), WMS or software access fees ($50 to $200 per month), minimum monthly spend requirements ($800 to $3,000 floor), and setup or onboarding fees ($500 to $2,500 one-off). These fixed fees are where small brands get burned: the variable per-order rate may look reasonable, but the fixed floor means the effective cost per order at low volume is materially higher than the headline.

The honest comparison between any two 3PL quotes requires normalising all six variable line items plus all recurring fixed fees against a realistic 90-day order profile. For a structured selection framework, see how to choose a 3PL.

Small Shopify brands (10 to 30 orders per day, 300 to 900 orders per month): typical monthly 3PL spend ranges from $1,200 to $3,500 for fulfilment excluding postage. Expect pick and pack at the higher end of the per-order range ($3.50 to $6.00), storage for a limited SKU range ($100 to $400 per month), and potentially a monthly minimum floor that pushes the effective per-order cost higher than the rate card suggests.

Mid-sized brands (30 to 100 orders per day, 900 to 3,000 orders per month): typical spend ranges from $3,500 to $12,000 per month excluding postage. Per-order rates tend to sit at $2.80 to $4.50 in this volume range, storage grows with SKU breadth, and the minimum-monthly-fee structure becomes less impactful as real volume outpaces the floor.

Growing brands (100 to 500 orders per day, 3,000 to 15,000 orders per month): typical spend ranges from $12,000 to $55,000 per month excluding postage. At this volume, per-order rates compress to $2.50 to $3.80, storage is the most variable line item (driven by SKU count and depth), and negotiated rates often apply. Brands at this scale should expect to negotiate, but the structure of the rate card matters more than the specific numbers.

The five most common hidden fees in Australian 3PL contracts, ranked by how often they surprise brands on invoice one: multi-item pick surcharges (the rate card advertises $3.00 per order, but orders with more than one SKU cost $3.00 plus $0.50 per additional item, turning a two-item order into $3.50 and a three-item order into $4.00). Insurance or risk loading (an additional 1 to 3% applied to all invoice line items with no corresponding service). Account inactivity fees (some providers charge a fixed fee if monthly volume drops below a threshold, with the charge structured as 'minimum account spend' rather than a penalty). Long-term storage fees (storage rate doubles or triples for SKUs that have not moved in 90 or 180 days, which penalises slow-moving inventory). Exit or account-closure fees (a final invoice covering 'transition support' or 'account wind-down' that can reach $1,500 to $5,000).

Each of these fees is usually listed somewhere in the contract, but rarely in the headline rate card. The due diligence step is to ask, in writing, for a full itemised schedule of all fees that could appear on an invoice, including conditions under which each is triggered. A provider unwilling to produce that document is communicating something about how they intend to invoice.

For the full Cryologix pricing structure and event glossary, see the Cryologix pricing page.

Plan-tier pricing (Starter, Growth, Scale, Enterprise) looks simpler at first glance because it collapses multiple line items into a single monthly number. The reality is that plan tiers hide the per-event cost structure behind a bundle, which makes it harder to forecast cost as volume changes, harder to compare providers, and harder to audit invoices.

Event-based pricing charges a defined fee per warehouse event. One receiving line per inbound unit. One storage line per active location. One pick-and-pack line per order. One returns line per returned item. Every charge maps to a physical event that either happened or did not. Month to month, you can see exactly what happened, what it cost, and why.

For a brand growing from 15 orders per day to 50 orders per day over twelve months, event-based pricing scales smoothly: the invoice grows in proportion to the work. Plan-tier pricing usually requires a plan change somewhere in that trajectory, and the plan change often comes with a minimum-volume clause that locks in the new tier's floor even in slower months. The brand is effectively paying a forecast bet rather than a cost of service.

See an instant quote for event-based pricing against your specific order profile, or the Sydney 3PL comparison guide for a structured evaluation of pricing structures across providers.