Every employee must be trained on the hazards at their workstation and the protective measures, on hiring and at least once a year thereafter (section 12 ArbSchG, section 4 DGUV Regulation 1). For young workers a six-monthly cycle applies. Training takes place during working time, must be understandable, and has to be evidenced in writing.
How often training is required
- On hiring and before taking up a new activity.
- Regularly thereafter, as a rule at least once a year.
- On changes: new equipment, a new workstation, new processes or after an accident.
- For young workers at least every six months (section 29 JArbSchG).
Training must take place during working hours and be understandable for the employees concerned.
The occasions that trigger immediate training
Alongside the annual cycle there are events after which training must follow without delay, regardless of when the last session was. In office businesses these are mainly:
- A new activity or transfer, including within the same building.
- New work equipment, such as a different type of office chair, height-adjustable desks, or new software that changes how work is organised.
- Relocation or refurbishment, because escape and rescue routes change.
- After an accident or near miss, with the actual sequence of events as the content.
- After a long absence, for example after parental leave or a long illness.
- Changed regulations or new findings from the risk assessment.
- Introducing remote work, see Remote work and telework.
The training-interval calculator works out when the next routine session falls due.
Which topics belong in an office
The content follows your risk assessment, not a generic template. What appears there as a hazard must be covered in training, and what is covered in training should appear there. Typical office topics are:
- Ergonomics and screen work: adjusting chair, desk and monitor, viewing distance, lighting and glare, screen breaks, the offer of occupational health screening.
- Behaviour in a fire: alerting, escape and rescue routes, assembly point, operating extinguishers, who the fire safety helpers are. Background in Fire safety in the office.
- First aid and reporting routes: who the first aiders are, where supplies are kept, how to call emergency services, how an accident is reported. See Accidents at work in the office.
- Electrical equipment: never plug one power strip into another, take damaged cables out of service, do not run heating appliances unattended.
- Traffic routes and fall hazards: cables, carpet edges, open drawers, storage on shelves, keeping escape routes clear. Slips, trips and falls are the typical accident type in administrative businesses.
- Mental stress: availability rules, dealing with work intensification, who to talk to.
- Remote work, where practised: setting up ergonomically, breaks, reporting routes after an accident at home.
An annual plan for an office
A single session that works through every topic once a year takes long and sticks poorly. In practice a split works better: one thorough core session per year, supplemented by short blocks.
- Core session, annually, around 45 minutes: hazards at your own workstation, behaviour in a fire, escape and rescue routes, first aid and reporting routes, electrical equipment, slip and trip hazards.
- Short block on ergonomics, around 15 minutes: adjusting chair, desk and monitor, screen breaks, the offer of occupational health screening.
- Short block on mental stress, around 15 minutes: dealing with work intensification, availability rules, who to talk to.
- As occasions arise: new premises after a relocation, the sequence of events of an accident, new work equipment.
In every case the content must follow from the risk assessment. Training on topics that do not appear there is just as conspicuous as a hazard that was assessed but never covered in training.
Who may deliver it and how long it takes
The employer is responsible. Delivery can be delegated, usually to managers, a named person in the business, or the occupational safety specialist. What matters is that the person delivering it commands the content and knows the specific workstation. Training presented by an external person with no knowledge of the premises stays generic and misses the point.
There is no statutory requirement on duration. The measure is whether the content is understood. For an office business, 45 to 60 minutes for the annual core session is a realistic figure, somewhat more for new hires, because the premises and reporting routes are explained for the first time.
Linguistic comprehensibility is part of the obligation. Employees who are not confident in German must be trained in a language they understand. A signature under a text that was not understood is worthless when it matters.
What the record must contain
The record is where inspections fail, not the content. These details belong on every training record:
- Date and duration of the session.
- The individual topics, not merely "occupational safety in general".
- Name of the person delivering it and their function.
- Names of participants with signatures or an equivalent digital confirmation.
- Who was absent and when the session was made up for them. This point is the one most often missing and the first place an inspection gets stuck.
A common mistake is the attendance list with no topics. It evidences that a session took place, but not what it covered, and that is exactly the question that matters after an accident.
A practical note on scheduling: do not put the annual session on a day with high absence, such as during the holiday period or the day before a long weekend. Every absentee creates a make-up case that has to be documented and tracked separately, and it is exactly these individual cases that get lost in daily work.
Training and risk assessment belong together
The two obligations are often organised separately but belong together in substance. The risk assessment establishes which hazards exist and which measures apply. Training ensures that employees know those measures and can apply them.
From this follows a simple test: put your risk assessment and your latest training record side by side. If a hazard appears there that was not covered in the training, something is missing. If a topic appears in the training that is not in the assessment, one of the two documents is out of date.
This cross-check takes ten minutes and uncovers most of the gaps that become an issue during an inspection. It is also the reason to update the risk assessment before the next training session, not after it.
Common mistakes in office businesses
- Trained once, never repeated. The induction session does not replace the annual cycle.
- Content does not match the risk assessment. A generic template covering production topics while leaving out screen work is substantively wrong.
- Absentees never caught up. Without a make-up session, anyone who was on leave drops out of the cycle for good.
- No topics in the record. Evidences the session, but not its content.
- Remote work not covered, even though it is practised.
- New starters left until the next group session. Training must happen before work begins, not three months later.
Digital rather than paper
Paper lists get lost, deadlines are missed, and when staff change nobody knows who is still outstanding. That is what training in office businesses fails on more often than any lack of willingness.
Three things solve most of the problem, whatever the tool: an overview showing the date of the last session per person, a reminder before the deadline rather than after it, and a fixed place for the records that a stand-in can also reach.
Safety Club runs safety training for office and administrative businesses digitally: automatic reminders, clear records, everything bundled in one interface, supported by an occupational safety specialist on site. You can see at any time who was trained and when. How getting started works is set out in the four-step process.
This article is general guidance and does not replace legal advice on your individual case. What governs is the current version of the regulations mentioned, together with how your employers' liability insurance association (Berufsgenossenschaft, BG) interprets it.
