The Material Handling Blog

Even if a forklift is developed to be as safe and ergonomic as possible, it can still be a dangerous tool if not used correctly. Almost all businesses that deal with materials handling will have a safety policy, but a busy, fast-moving warehouse will always be an environment where safety is highly important.

Fortunately, warehouse work can be made much safer when some basic rules are followed closely, and potentially risky practices are completely avoided. This list is a long one, but here are a few basic rules which are important to remember in your daily work.

For some businesses, the amount of money spent on fixing damage to forklifts caused by poor or careless driving can be painfully high. These costs not only make the operation less efficient and eat up budget, they're also completely avoidable.

Maintenance costs will always be a fact of life, but it's possible to drastically reduce the costs of avoidable damage by investing in your operators.

When the time to purchase new forklifts comes, the focus is always on costs. This makes sense — no-one in business would want to spend money unneccessarily, and if a machine can do the job, then the lower the cost, the better.

Costs will always be an important factor. But which ones? When thinking about the money you're going to spend on your forklift over its lifetime, you'll only make the best decision if you consider your hard and soft costs.

Everyone could easily lift a package weighing a few kilograms, but what if you had to pick that same package hundreds of times a day, over the course of weeks and months, possibly from hard-to-reach places? You’d probably start feeling the strain quite quickly, and you’d end up hoping you had some equipment or solution to make the job easier.

This is what order pickers do, but unfortunately the strain and injury that can occur in this job over long periods is still not as well-known as it could be.

Operating a forklift is a demanding job, and the stresses of a busy materials handling operation can put strain on drivers. This doesn't only make them uncomfortable and prone to injury, but also makes them less efficient and productive, harming the operation's bottom line.

Fortunately, the physical challenges of logistics work can be made much easier with the help of ergonomic design — not only does it make the job much safer and more comfortable for drivers, but also increases overall productivity. Let's take a look at the main causes of strain and injury in the warehouse, and how they can be mitigated with ergonomics.

When you've spent money on new equipment, and invested time and even more budget in safety training and education, damage to forklifts can be a major headache that can increase downtime and endanger staff.

But aside from training, maintaining a safe warehouse environment, and choosing ergonomic trucks with good visibility and handling, how can you reduce accidents? Especially those kinds of accidents that never seem to have been caused by anyone.

The answer may be in technology — specifically, in fleet management systems that can allow you to keep an eye on every truck in your fleet, all the time.

The ‘dead man’s switch’, or ‘dead man’s pedal’ is a standard safety feature on many forklifts, but it hasn’t seen much innovation over the years.

These switches appear on lots of different vehicles and machines, and are designed to stop the machine from operating if the driver isn’t in full control. In the case of a forklift, the dead man’s switch must be held down (usually with the foot) in order for the truck to operate. This makes sure that if the driver becomes incapacitated, isn’t in control of the truck, or even isn’t in it at all, it won’t be able to move.

It’s a smart and simple solution that has prevented countless accidents. But on trucks where the operator is standing, like some order pickers, it’s far from the perfect solution and can even introduce some new safety issues itself. Here’s why:

Forklift safety is vital in the modern warehouse. If you want to keep efficiency high and staff happy, making sure that forklift drivers know the rules is essential. Paying attention to the regulations also reduces the risk of breaking the law, too.

Accidents can harm your bottom line and damage your company's reputation - so keeping the best practice at the top of your mind is important.