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The question “from how many kilos do I need a lifting aid?” has no number as its answer – and that is not evasion but the law. German manual handling regulations require a risk assessment, not compliance with a threshold. What that assessment weighs, and how to reach a defensible answer, is set out here.
The German ordinance on safety and health in the manual handling of loads obliges the employer to avoid manual handling where it presents a risk and, where it is unavoidable, to reduce that risk. There is no number in it. That is not an omission but intent: whether 20 kilograms is dangerous depends on how often, in what posture and under what conditions it is moved.
For exactly this assessment the Federal Institute for Occupational Safety and Health provides the key indicator method. It weighs four groups: time rating – how often and how long –, load rating, posture rating and the working conditions. The sum produces a score and from it a risk range. What matters is the interplay: a moderate weight in a twisted posture, often repeated, reaches the critical range faster than a heavy single load handled upright.
A picker moving 800 cartons of 12 kilograms each shifts just under ten tonnes per shift. No single movement is critical; the sum is. These workstations are regularly overlooked in assessments because the individual weight looks harmless. The key indicator method captures exactly that – and it is the reason lifting aids are needed more often in intralogistics than in heavy assembly.
German occupational safety law sets a fixed sequence: first eliminate the hazard at source, then technical protective measures, then organisational, lastly personal. In practice that means a lifting aid takes precedence over back training, and a differently built workstation takes precedence over the lifting aid. Anyone following this order also stands well in an inspection by the accident insurance institution.
The argument from avoided sick days is correct but hard to prove – the back injury of 2032 cannot be attributed to an investment made in 2026. The more defensible effect is immediately measurable: output at the end of the shift. Someone who guides the load rather than lifting it is nearly as fast in the eighth hour as in the second. That difference is larger than most process improvements and appears in no accident statistic.
Watch the workstation for an hour and count. Note weight, frequency, pick-up and delivery height, and whether anyone twists while doing it. That gives the four ratings of the key indicator method. If you like, we take on that part as a workplace analysis – including the question of which design solves the task and what the unit does not have to be able to do.
There is no statutory threshold. German manual handling regulations require a risk assessment; the key indicator method provides the score. In practice it becomes critical from 15 to 20 kg with frequent repetition, from 25 kg even for individual lifts – and always when two people lift, work goes above shoulder height, or a load is twisted.
An assessment procedure of the Federal Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. It weighs time rating, load rating, posture rating and working conditions and derives a risk range from them. It is the recognised tool for meeting the assessment duty in manual handling.
As a rule, no. Occupational safety law requires technical measures to be examined before organisational and personal ones. Training is the weakest of the three levels and does not replace an available technical solution.
Usually yes, but not through the sickness statistics. The defensible effect is constant output across the shift and the elimination of the second person on two-person lifts. Both can be measured and calculated at the workstation.
Weightless handling – floating instead of lifting.
View deviceCompact power for vertical lifting.
View deviceThe jointed arm for millimetre-precise handling.
View deviceArticulated arm plus integrated lifting axis.
View deviceWe look at the workstation before we talk about equipment.
ViewLoad, reach, cycle time – plus grippers for anything without a catalogue entry.
ViewLifting equipment, manipulators and balancers for industry, medical technology and logistics.
ViewManaging Director, Entracon Planungsgesellschaft mbH
Engineer with a doctorate, specialising in plant engineering, digital design and process automation – from simulation through to commissioning.
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Start typing – for example “balancer”, “SAP” or “pipe stress”.
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