Free storage is another method of favoritism, sometimes used systematically and extensively, as described by the Commission. “A shipper sends a carload of freight to a specific destination consigned to his order by arrangement with the carrier. The freight is kept in the car or freight house or some warehouse which the carrier controls, and on orders of the shipper or his agent issued from time to time the freight is delivered in small lots to designated persons. These persons are the actual consignees, and the shipper is enabled by this means to avoid paying the higher less-than-carload rate and to reap other advantages through this privilege of storage. Such special facilities as storage, handling, cartage, distribution, and reshipment of less quantities, either without charge or at extremely low compensation for the character of the service, amounted substantially to providing a shipper with branch business houses.”[72] Overbilling and underbilling have been found to be very convenient substitutes for the rebate. A bill of lading may acknowledge the receipt of 70 barrels of flour; 65 only are shipped, and the railway pays damages for the loss of the 5 non-existent barrels. On the other hand railroads have been known to suggest to millers that they ship flour on the generous plan of shipping 200 barrels and billing 125.[73] Some shippers have been allowed to ship only 4 boxes of peaches to the hundred lbs., while others were permitted to ship 6 boxes to the hundred lbs. “That is the billing. Sometimes peaches are billed 4 boxes to the hundred lbs. to one point, and 6 boxes to the hundred lbs. to a point 350 miles farther on.”[74] At another time the cashier of an important firm is made a nominal agent for the railway company, and under the name of commission to him an enormous rebate is allowed for all the business his employers send over the line. Or again, the railway company purchases from a favored trader its supplies of the goods in which he deals, at a fancy price. The “expense bill system” has proved to be an instrument of preference and fraud. On presentation of an “expense bill” showing payment for shipments into Kansas City the railroads would allow reshipment of an equal weight from Kansas City to Chicago at the balance of the through rate from the point of origin to Chicago.[75] This gave grain from the West an advantage over grain grown near Kansas City. When the rate from Kansas City to Chicago was 20 cents on wheat and 17 cents on corn the grain carried on the balance of the through rate under the expense bill system was carried 8 to 10 cents less than grain grown in Missouri and Iowa.[76] Not satisfied with the discounts obtained on actual expense bills, shippers altered bills and forged new ones to enlarge their traffic at the cut rates. In this way “expense bills showing a high balance were constantly substituted for those showing a low balance.”[77]