Occupational safety specialist for offices in the Rhineland

Safety Club provides the external occupational safety specialist for office businesses in the Rhineland: one contract, a specialist from the network on site and audit-proof documentation in the client portal.

• Köln
• Düsseldorf
• Bonn
• Mönchengladbach
• Aachen
• Krefeld
• Neuss
• Leverkusen
• Solingen
• Remscheid
• and more

Safety authorities and VBG offices in the Rhineland, city by city

In North Rhine-Westphalia, state occupational safety lies with the district governments (Bezirksregierungen), or more precisely with their occupational safety departments. In the Rhineland, these are the district governments in Cologne and Düsseldorf. The VBG, by contrast, assigns businesses to its district offices by postcode. That puts Solingen and Remscheid under a different district office from Düsseldorf, Mönchengladbach, Krefeld and Neuss, although all six cities belong to the Düsseldorf administrative district.

Each district government has three occupational safety departments, split by sector, so a business's sector decides which one handles it. According to the state labour ministry, department 57 covers logistics, food and administration. State supervision and the VBG are separate bodies with separate remits: the district government enforces the Occupational Health and Safety Act and the Working Hours Act, for example, while the VBG enforces its own accident prevention regulations. 5 questions the accident insurer asks on site sets out what to expect when the insurer's inspector calls.

Agencies in Düsseldorf and Cologne: training at the pace of hiring

Advertising and creative agencies hire often and at short notice: junior staff, interns, working students for a semester. The Occupational Health and Safety Act requires safety training on recruitment and before work begins (section 12 ArbSchG). With new starters every month, one group session a year cannot cover that. One practical solution is a fixed block on the first day covering the escape route, assembly point, first aiders and setting up one's own workstation, recorded by signature or digitally.

Agencies with many part-time staff easily miss the threshold of 20 employees. Part-time staff count proportionally towards the threshold of 20: up to 20 hours a week as 0.5, up to 30 hours as 0.75. An agency with 17 full-time posts and eight working students on 20 hours a week each reaches 21. It therefore needs an occupational safety committee that meets once per calendar quarter (section 11 ASiG). The ASA planner spreads the meetings across the year.

Insurers and media houses in Cologne: large buildings, specialist technology

In the insurers' large back-office buildings, every support threshold applies at once, from the occupational safety committee to safety officers, who are required from 50 employees in the office (section 22 SGB VII, since 29 May 2026). Where many staff work from home, check the number of first aiders and fire wardens: what counts is who is actually in the building, and on a Friday that is a different number from a Tuesday.

Alongside their newsrooms, media houses run control rooms, studios and edit suites, and sometimes their own server rooms. Kit that travels to shoots, such as cameras, lights and cable drums, takes more wear than equipment that stays in the office. The business sets the test intervals under DGUV Regulation 3 in its risk assessment, and for equipment like this they are usually shorter. The test-interval calculator works out suitable intervals.

Bonn associations with a second office in Berlin

Many associations and internationally active organisations are based in Bonn. If a Bonn association also runs an office in Berlin, occupational safety law sees two workplaces in two federal states. The Bonn office is supervised by the Bezirksregierung Köln, the Berlin office by the Landesamt für Arbeitsschutz, Gesundheitsschutz und technische Sicherheit (LAGetSi). In each case, the location of the premises decides.

Each workplace needs its own risk assessment, its own first aiders and its own notice with emergency numbers and contacts (see Notices offices must display by law). The specialist therefore carries out a separate walkthrough at each site, even when both fall under one support contract.

Related

• Occupational safety for advertising and creative agencies: New starters, desk sharing and shoot days from the risk assessment's point of view.
• Occupational safety for insurance: Back office, field staff and claims inspections.
• Occupational safety for associations and clubs: Head offices, committee meetings and volunteers.
• Training-interval calculator: When each person's next safety training is due.
• External occupational safety specialist: The scope of support and how the hours are calculated.

Legal basis

• Occupational Health and Safety Act (ArbSchG)
• Occupational Safety Act (ASiG)
• Social Code Book VII (SGB VII), statutory accident insurance
• DGUV Regulation 3 (electrical installations and equipment)
• DGUV Regulation 1 (principles of prevention)

Frequently asked questions