Inside OSHA’s Warehouse Emphasis: How To Pass An Inspection Without Slowing Your Operation

Warehousing and distribution were already on OSHA’s radar when e commerce growth accelerated pace and injury rates followed. In 2023, the agency launched a National Emphasis Program that targets warehouses, distribution centers, parcel and mail processing, and certain high injury retail establishments. That initiative is still shaping inspections in 2025. OSHA’s topic pages reinforce the same focus areas, which now include ergonomics alongside the traditional hazards of powered industrial trucks, storage and egress, and material handling. A public report by the Government Accountability Office urged OSHA to improve training and guidance on ergonomic hazards in warehouses and to evaluate the effectiveness of its inspection program, which gives you a sense of where agency attention is headed. State plans have been adopting the federal instruction and refreshing their own versions, a signal that this emphasis is not going away.

If you want to picture what an inspection looks like under this emphasis, imagine a long, steady walk that tracks your flow of people and goods. The first stop is often powered industrial trucks. Inspectors ask how you qualify operators, how you handle short tenured workers, how you evaluate performance during the first weeks on a new shift, and how near misses are captured and corrected. OSHA keeps a full topic area on powered industrial trucks and points repeatedly to operator evaluation and retraining after unsafe operations. In a high turnover environment, the way you handle the first month matters more than the wording of your policy. A strong program brings supervisors into daily checks, pairs new operators with experienced mentors, and treats near misses as coaching moments documented the same day. Traffic segregation, charging area controls, and pedestrian awareness are as important as the operator’s individual skill. The highest skill can be undone by blind corners and unclear right of way.

From there, the route moves to storage and egress. Inspectors look for racking damage, safe stacking, and aisles that do not become choke points during peak hours. They look for exit routes that are clear during both normal operations and rushes, not just during an audit. They will ask how you inspect racks and how you decide when a beam or column must be taken out of service. If the answers are ad hoc, the conversation turns toward training and procedures. If you can show inspection criteria, real examples of repairs, and a pattern of proactive replacement, you have credibility. The point is not to achieve museum quality order. The point is to keep gravity from being your biggest risk during a shift that started short staffed.

Ergonomics is the piece that many operations still treat as a soft topic. The GAO report made it clear that musculoskeletal disorders are a leading source of harm in warehouse work and asked OSHA to strengthen how it identifies and addresses these risks. For an employer, the practical path is not mystery. Analyze the tasks that drive sprains and strains. Adjust pace to match human capability. Rotate tasks so that reach, twist, and lift do not hammer the same joints for eight hours. Redesign workstations so the next pick is within a safe range and heavy items are staged at a height that does not force stooping. Then train the basics and track whether changes reduce discomfort reports and days away. You do not need a federal ergonomics standard to do this work. You need management attention and the courage to adjust production expectations so that they match bodies, not the other way around.

State plan activity reinforces the signal. Several states adopted the federal warehouse NEP or refreshed their instructions in 2024 and 2025, citing higher injury rates in covered industries compared with private industry averages. When state programs move in step with federal OSHA, it tells you that the underlying risk picture is consistent. If you operate across states, do not assume the absence of a local press release means the absence of attention. Treat the federal program as your baseline and then check your state plan site for any additional priorities or sector lists.

The culture piece matters here too. Warehouses are tempo driven. That means the conditions that create injuries often appear at the edges of a shift or a peak period. Build your inspection routine around those edges. Walk the floor during the first hour of the Monday wave and the last hour before a cutoff. Ask operators and pickers what feels rushed or awkward. Adjust assignment rules and aisle layouts to smooth those pressure points. The initiative allows compliance officers to expand scope when they find problems. Your job is to make it easy for them to see consistent controls even when the pace is highest.

Sources and further reading: OSHA topic pages on Powered Industrial Trucks at osha.gov/powered-industrial-trucks. OSHA announcements on the Warehouse National Emphasis Program. GAO report on warehouse safety and OSHA oversight. State plan adoption notices.