The seven most common risk assessment mistakes in offices are: it is produced once and never updated, mental stress is missing, working-from-home workstations are missing, no measures are derived, the effectiveness check is missing, the document carries neither a date nor an owner, and the template was taken unchecked from a production business.
The risk assessment is the systematic identification and evaluation of all hazards at a workplace required by section 5 ArbSchG. Structure and minimum content are covered in Risk assessment in the office. This article starts where the assessment already exists.
| Mistake | How to spot it | Legal basis |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Never updated | date older than the last move | section 3 paragraph 1 sentence 3 ArbSchG |
| 2. Mental stress missing | no dedicated section, only a tick box | section 5 paragraph 3 number 6 ArbSchG |
| 3. Working from home missing | only workstations on company premises assessed | section 5 ArbSchG, section 2 paragraph 7 ArbStättV |
| 4. No measures derived | hazards listed, measures column empty | sections 3 paragraph 1 and 4 ArbSchG |
| 5. No effectiveness check | measures without a documented result | sections 3 paragraph 1 sentence 3 and 6 ArbSchG |
| 6. No date, no owner | no date, no responsible person | section 6 paragraph 1 ArbSchG |
| 7. Template from another sector | machinery at length, screen work in general terms | section 5 paragraph 1 ArbSchG |
Mistake 1: Produced once and never updated
A risk assessment must be adapted under section 3 paragraph 1 sentence 3 ArbSchG as soon as circumstances change. The most common mistake in office businesses is a document dated in the year the company was founded, although a move, new workstations and working from home have been added since. The act names no fixed interval, but it does name triggers.
The triggers are concrete: altered workstations through a move, a refurbishment or desk sharing, new work equipment, new activities, an accident, changed regulations. The move is the most frequent of them and changes exactly what an inspection looks at first: room layout, traffic routes and escape routes.
Updating is also not overwriting. If the file is replaced each time, the record only shows today's position and cannot prove, after an accident, what applied then. An annual review is customary on top of the triggers, in practice tied to the safety training under section 4 DGUV Regulation 1, whose deadlines the training-interval calculator shows.
Mistake 2: Mental stress is missing
Mental stress at work is expressly part of the risk assessment under section 5 paragraph 3 number 6 ArbSchG. It is by far the most common substantive gap in office businesses: the item appears as a line in the checklist, ticked off as unremarkable, with no survey method, no result and no derived measure.
A tick box is not an assessment. What is required is a view per activity, in practice along the five characteristic areas of the Joint German Occupational Safety Strategy: work content, work organisation, social relationships, working environment, and new forms of work.
The reason for the gap is rarely refusal, it is the method: mental stress cannot be established by walking through the building, only through a survey, a workshop or an observation interview. Surveys also have to be evaluated so that no conclusions about individuals are possible. How that works in practice is covered in Mental stress in the risk assessment.
Mistake 3: Working from home and mobile working are missing
The assessment duty under section 5 ArbSchG does not stop at the office door. If the working-from-home workstation is missing although people in the business regularly work from home, the record is incomplete. The mistake usually comes from uncertainty about which rules apply in a private home at all.
A telework workstation under section 2 paragraph 7 ArbStättV is a screen workstation permanently installed by the employer in the employee's private home, for which furniture and work equipment are provided and the weekly working time and duration are agreed. Mobile working, by contrast, is location-independent work without a permanently installed workstation. Which of the two it is decides which rules apply.
| Place of work | Workplace Ordinance | Risk assessment under section 5 ArbSchG |
|---|---|---|
| workstation on company premises | applies in full | mandatory |
| telework workstation under section 2 paragraph 7 ArbStättV | applies in part, including Annex number 6 | mandatory, on first installation |
| mobile working without a fixed workstation | does not apply | mandatory, activity-based |
Mobile working therefore has to be assessed too, just not the individual kitchen table. What is assessed is screen work without ergonomic equipment, the blurring of working hours, and the reporting routes after an accident. The detail is covered in Remote work and telework.
Mistake 4: Hazards listed, but no measures derived
A risk assessment without measures is an inventory, not an assessment. Section 3 paragraph 1 ArbSchG obliges the employer to take the necessary occupational safety measures, and section 6 paragraph 1 ArbSchG requires the measures decided on to be documented. The empty measures column is a frequent finding in office businesses.
Every measure needs two entries, otherwise it stays an intention: a responsible person and a deadline. "Fit anti-glare blinds, owner facility management, due 31 October" is a measure. "Look into anti-glare blinds" is not.
The second half of this mistake is the hierarchy of controls. Section 4 ArbSchG requires hazards to be tackled at source first; engineering measures come before organisational ones, and organisational before measures aimed at the individual. A cable across a traffic route therefore belongs in a cable duct, not in a training session. An assessment whose only measures are training sessions inverts that order.
Mistake 5: The effectiveness check is missing
Under section 3 paragraph 1 sentence 3 ArbSchG the employer must review the measures taken for effectiveness and adapt them where necessary. Under section 6 paragraph 1 ArbSchG the result of that review belongs in the documentation. This is the step most often missing in practice, including in assessments that are otherwise well kept.
An effectiveness check is the documented review of whether an implemented measure has actually removed or reduced the hazard. It is not the same as an implementation check: "Cable duct fitted on 12 May" proves implementation, "traffic route walked again on 20 June, no loose cables found" proves effectiveness. Both lines belong in the record.
The method follows the measure: technical measures are checked at the next walkthrough, organisational ones by asking the people affected, measures on mental stress with a repeat survey after roughly twelve months. In practice the check fails for want of dates: whoever enters the deadline but no review date afterwards loses track of it.
Mistake 6: No date and no owner
Section 6 ArbSchG does not expressly require a signature on the risk assessment. What it requires is documentation of the result, the measures decided on and the result of the review. Even so, a record without a date and without visible ownership counts against the business in every inspection, because neither its status nor its authorship can be proven.
Three entries therefore belong on every version: the date of production or update, the person or function accountable for the assessment, and a note on who contributed professionally, usually the occupational safety specialist and the occupational physician. The employer stays responsible: producing the assessment can be delegated, responsibility cannot.
The value shows after an accident, because without a date there is no way to show that the hazard was identified and a measure taken beforehand. How reporting works afterwards is covered in Accidents at work in the office. On the consequences: failing to comply with an enforceable order of the supervisory authority under section 22 paragraph 3 ArbSchG can be fined as an administrative offence up to 25,000 euros under section 25 ArbSchG.
Mistake 7: A production template taken over unchecked
A template supplies the outline, not the assessment. If a sample from a production or trades business is taken over unchecked, the result is a record that formally exists and substantively misses the business: machinery, hazardous substances and personal protective equipment across pages, screen work and mental stress in one sentence each.
Where a template comes from is visible in its weighting, not in its title. For office and administrative businesses these areas must appear as separate items: screen work under Annex number 6 of the Workplace Ordinance, mental stress, working from home, traffic routes and trip hazards, escape routes, electrical equipment, first aid and fire safety, plus groups needing special protection.
The reverse holds too: a template carrying hazards from manufacturing or a laboratory although those areas do not exist creates entries with no connection to reality. Why the office risk profile is narrow but deep is covered in Sector focus, not a catch-all; the quickest comparison against the office standard is the office safety checklist.
Checking your own risk assessment in five steps
The check takes about 45 minutes and needs three documents: the current risk assessment, the last walkthrough report, and a list of what has changed in the business since the last update.
- Check the date and revision status. See when the assessment was last updated and compare that with what has changed in the business: a move, a refurbishment, new work equipment, new activities, working from home.
- Look for the two gap topics. Search specifically for mental stress and for working from home or telework. If either is missing, or covered in a single sentence, the assessment is incomplete under section 5 ArbSchG.
- Check measures for an owner and a deadline. Go through every measure entered: is there a named responsible person and a concrete date? Measures without both cannot be implemented and cannot be checked.
- Look for the effectiveness check. Check whether completed measures carry a documented result of the review. Under section 6 paragraph 1 ArbSchG that result belongs in the record, not just the measure itself.
- Check where the template came from. Read the structure: if machinery, hazardous substances and noise are covered in detail while screen work is only general, the template comes from another sector.
If several points come out negative, the next step is not a rewrite. As a rule it is enough to add the missing topics, extend the list of measures with owners and deadlines, and file the whole thing with a date as a new version.
Safety Club produces and maintains the risk assessment for office and administrative businesses as part of its support: an occupational safety specialist on site plus digital, audit-proof documentation that belongs to the business. We review your existing assessment in an initial consultation.
This article is general guidance and does not replace legal advice on your individual case. What governs is the current version of the ArbSchG, ArbStättV and DGUV Regulation 1, together with how the accident insurance institution that covers you interprets it.
