There are actually a range of safety features which are common to particular types of trucks like seat belts on sit-down vehicles. On most stand-up vehicles there are dead-man petals too. Moreover, some manufacturers are providing extra features like for instance speed controls that are able to reduce the overall speed based on load height and steering angle. For more information, there are numerous articles available on Lift Truck Safety and Loading Dock Safety.
Service and Support
Making sure you would maintain access to high levels of support and service is a very vital part of lift truck selection. There seem to be a range of new players within the lift truck business every year. Although they provide a decent lift truck design and a good price, if they do not provide the local or regional service and support infrastructure, you must be ready for major stress when the lift truck breaks. Each and every lift truck model goes down sooner or later and parts, service and general questions would probably need to be answered at some point.
You will normally want to have a nearby dealer or repair shop with a full supply of the components you need for your particular unit. Be sure to visit the repair shop or the dealership and check their parts room in order to try to understand how many parts they stock. Make sure to inquire that if they do not have the part you require, where would it come from? With a bit of luck, the answer would be from a regional or local distribution facility.
Furthermore, try to get some ideas as to how many of those particular units are currently being utilized within your area. This is very vital for specialty trucks like turret trucks. If there are only a small amount of trucks in use in their service area that you must assume they may not be stocking many if any parts for them. What's more, they could have very little overall experience in servicing that particular model as well.