Hazardous manual task risk assessment app
A manual handling assessment looks at one task in detail: the load, the postures, how often and for how long, the workplace layout and the work organisation around it. An ergonomist will often film the task, note the forces and repetition, and rate the risk before recommending changes to the task itself rather than to how the worker lifts. SurveyThanks keeps each task as its own record with the observations, photos and ratings that support the recommendation.
Built for ergonomists running teams of roughly 3–50 inspectors.
Sample Task risk assessment
An illustrative excerpt. The site, readings and findings are fictional; the layout is yours to set.
Task risk assessment
Task 3 — Loading cartons onto outbound pallets
- Workplace
- Fictional Beverages, dispatch area
- Assessed
- 5 March 2026
- Workers performing task
- 4 per shift
| Risk factor | Observation | Risk |
|---|---|---|
| Load | 12 kg cartons, handles on two sides | Risk: Moderate |
| Posture | Bending below knee height for the bottom two layers | Risk: High |
| Repetition | About 240 cartons per hour at peak | Risk: High |
| Layout | Conveyor end sits 400 mm from the pallet | Risk: Low |
Fields captured on site
Your firm builds the form in-app, so these are a starting point rather than a fixed schema. Every field is captured on the device, with or without signal, and lands in the task risk assessment where your template puts it.
Task description
- Task name and location
- Workers performing the task
- Frequency and duration
- Photos of the key postures
Risk factors
- Load weight and characteristics
- Postures observed
- Forces (push, pull, carry)
- Repetition
- Environment (heat, space, floor)
Controls
- Recommended change
- Level in the hierarchy of controls
- Interim measure
- Review date
Standards the report works to
- Work Health and Safety Regulations 2011Model WHS Regulations — Part 4.2 Hazardous manual tasks
- The duty to manage musculoskeletal disorder risks and the factors that must be considered.
- Code of PracticeHazardous manual tasks (Safe Work Australia)
- The risk factors, assessment approach and control examples the report follows.
Load the standards you hold into your reference library and the drafted prose is written against them rather than against a general model.
How the task risk assessment gets built
Capture it once, offline
Your firm builds the manual handling assessment form in-app — 25 field types, nesting repeatable groups, compound AND/OR visibility rules, reusable modules and calculated fields. Field capture works with no signal: jobs, forms, photos, notes and audio all queue in an idempotent outbox that only clears once the server confirms receipt.
Link it to your areas, tasks and plant
Enter areas, tasks and plant once, as a register. Every one of your hazards, controls and findings then points at a stored row rather than a name somebody typed — and the links survive a disconnected device.
Render your own template
The task risk assessment renders into the Word template you already use — your letterhead, your section order, your clause library — with conditionals, loops over repeats, composable sub-templates and photo grids.
Reviewed before it leaves
You write the review framework: a checklist of what a task risk assessment must contain, plus the prose standards you would mark a junior against. Link it to a report template and it runs every time that template renders. Each finding comes back graded info, minor or major, quoting the sentence at fault, and a person accepts or dismisses every one.
Because the structured submission behind the report is held too, the review is a comparison rather than a proofread: The report says all plant is guarded; the form carries an unguarded drive shaft in the workshop.
Checks a WHS consulting framework usually carries
- Every finding cites the regulation, code or clause it is assessed against
- Every hazard has a control and a person responsible for it
- Risk ratings are applied consistently across findings of the same kind
- Corrective actions are specific enough to be actioned and dated
Questions
- Can we assess several tasks at one workplace in one visit?
- Yes. Each task is a repeated section with its own risk factors, so a single visit covers dispatch, receiving and picking as separate tasks in one report.
- Can our scoring tool be built into the form?
- If your method scores risk factors numerically, calculated fields can total and band the score as it is entered. The method itself is yours to define.
- Can a video of the task go in the report?
- Photos render into your Word template as a grid. Video does not embed in a Word or PDF report, so most ergonomists pick still frames that show the key postures.
What this is not
Worth knowing before you book a demo, so neither of us wastes the half hour.
- Not field-service dispatch. No timesheets, no parts, no inventory. Scheduling exists to get an inspector to a site.
- No signature capture. If your deliverable has to carry a signed sign-off on the artefact itself, this is not the tool yet.
- Field capture is what works offline — jobs, forms, photos, notes and audio. Reports, chat, scheduling and the inbox need a connection.
- No client portal. Reports go out as a file or a password-protected link.
Other WHS consulting work we cover
- Remote worker site checksRemote site report
- Workplace WHS auditsWHS audit report
- Contractor prequalification auditsPrequal audit report
- Hazard identification walksHazard register report
- Hazardous chemical auditsChemWatch register audit
- Incident investigationsICAM investigation report
- Machine guarding auditsGuarding audit report
- Near miss capture programsNear miss register
Other disciplines
Rebuild your task risk assessment in SurveyThanks
Bring the Word template you already send clients. If you are coming off another field-forms tool, a filled report can be uploaded, read field by field, and re-rendered into your template.