UNITED KINGDOM / AGILITYPR.NEWS / October 14, 2026 / New research from the CIPD shows UK workplace absences have climbed to an average of 9.4 days per employee per year - the highest level in more than fifteen years. Musculoskeletal issues remain among the most cited health conditions affecting staff.

Pallet Trucks UK says the figures are a useful prompt for e-commerce and fulfilment businesses to revisit their manual handling risk assessments, rather than treating them as a box ticked once and forgotten.

For fast-growing online retailers in particular, risk assessments completed when an operation was smaller or slower often don't reflect how the business runs now. Order volumes rise, picking rates increase, and the physical demands placed on staff moving stock around a fulfilment space can change considerably without anyone formally reassessing whether the equipment - such as  pallet trucks, stackers and lift tables - and processes in place still match the risk.

Phil Chesworth, Managing Director at Pallet Trucks UK, said, "Absence figures like this may be read as purely HR statistics, but for anyone running a warehouse or fulfilment operation, there's a much more practical question underneath it. If musculoskeletal issues are genuinely one of the biggest drivers of time off work nationally, it's worth asking whether your own manual handling risk assessment still reflects what's happening on your floor today.

"We talk to a lot of growing e-commerce businesses where the risk assessment was done early on, when order volumes were a fraction of what they are now. Nobody goes back and checks whether the equipment that was fine for twenty orders a day is still appropriate for two hundred.

"It doesn't need to be a huge exercise. Looking honestly at whether staff are handling more stock, more often, or for longer stretches than when the assessment was last written is a reasonable starting point, and it often points fairly quickly to where equipment, not just process, needs to catch up."

With absence at its highest level in over fifteen years, this feels like exactly the moment to make sure handling equipment isn't contributing to a problem that's already costing businesses nationally.

For more information, please visit: www.pallettrucksuk.co.uk.