There are actually a range of safety features that are common to particular kinds of trucks like seat belts on sit-down vehicles. On the majority of stand-up vehicles there are dead-man petals too. Furthermore, some manufacturers are providing extra features such as speed controls which can reduce the overall speed based on steering angle and load height. For more info, there are many available articles about Loading Dock Safety and Lift Truck Safety.
Support and Service
Making sure you would maintain access to high levels of support and service is a really important part of forklift selection. There seem to be a variety of new players in the forklift industry each and every year. Although they provide a good price and a decent forklift design, if they do not provide the regional or local service and support infrastructure, you have to be ready for major stress when the forklift breaks. Each and every lift truck model goes down at some point and parts, service and general questions will probably have to be addressed at some point.
Usually, you would want a local dealer or repair shop with a great supply of components for the specific model and make you are purchasing. Be sure to visit the dealership or the repair shop 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 component you need, where would it come from? With any luck, the answer would be from a regional or local distribution facility.
Try to get some additional ideas on the units presently used within your area. This is doubly essential for specialty trucks such as turret trucks. If there are only a small amount of trucks in use in their service area that you must assume they might not be stocking many if any parts for them. Moreover, they may have very little overall experience in servicing that model as well.