Lifters & Loaders

A lift table raises a load to the height the work is actually done at, instead of asking someone to bend to the floor for it. This range covers scissor lift tables and static hydraulic lift tables, self-levelling pallet lifters and pallet level loaders, the PalletDisc rotating positioner, VULCAN mini lifters, warehouse lifters and transporters, and heavy duty drum lifters — all manufactured in the UK by GPC Industries.

Raising a pallet or a work platform to waist height is one of the most effective controls available under the Manual Handling Operations Regulations 1992, and lifting equipment used at work falls under LOLER 1998 and PUWER 1998. Below you will find live prices, honest price bands for the whole UK market, real load capacities from our own product data, and straight answers to the questions buyers actually ask — including the one nobody in this market writes down: a scissor lift table is not a scissor lift.

One machine, half a dozen names

Part of what makes this category hard to shop for is that nothing has a settled name. A lift table is also sold as a lifting table, a hydraulic lift table, a scissor lift table, a lift cart, a scissor lift trolley, a material lift or simply a load lifter — and on the pallet side as a pallet lifter, pallet riser, pallet level loader or pallet positioner. They are not all the same machine, but the words are used as though they were. The sections below say what each one actually does, so you can match the product to the job rather than to the search term.

Lift tables and lifters: prices at a glance

Every price below is the current price on this site. Capacities are the manufacturer's published figures; where GPC does not publish a rating we have said so rather than estimate one.

One search term worth clearing up first, because it sends most people to the wrong page. If you searched “pallet lifter”, you are almost certainly looking for a high-lift pallet truck or a pallet stacker — a machine that picks a pallet up on forks and moves it — rather than a lift table. That is a different category and we stock it: see high-lift pallet trucks, pallet trucks and pallet stackers. Everything on this page raises a load to a working height; it does not carry it around the building.

Model	Type	Capacity / lift	Price
PLD1100	PalletDisc rotating positioner	Low-profile floor turntable	£1,440.36
MLTD100Y	Double scissor lift trolley (mobile)	1,000 kg	£1,512.24
DLL03Z	Heavy duty drum lifter	500 mm lift height	£1,554.30
MLE04Y	VULCAN electric mini lifter	100 kg	£1,624.20
MLE03Y	VULCAN electric mini lifter	150 kg	£1,667.64
EL1200Y	VULCAN electric mini lifter	400 kg, 1,200 mm lift	£1,890.00
DLL04Z	Heavy duty drum lifter (steel or plastic drums)	800 mm lift height	£1,900.02
PLL1211	Pallet level loader	Self-levelling, spring-set	£2,255.28
PLL1312	Pallet level loader with bellows	Self-levelling, dust-skirted	£2,734.38
PSL80F	Static lift table, full platform	1,000 kg	£2,902.86
PSL82U	Static lift table, U-shaped platform	1,000 kg	£2,902.86
PSL105F	Static lift table, full platform	2,000 kg	£3,756.24
LTML086	Warehouse lifter / transporter	100 kg, 1,500 mm lift	£5,582.28
LTML115	Warehouse lifter / transporter	100 kg, 2,000 mm lift	£6,568.92
LTML144	Warehouse lifter / transporter	100 kg, 2,300 mm lift	£6,645.36
LTML106	Warehouse lifter / transporter	200 kg, 1,500 mm lift	£6,798.24
LTML135	Warehouse lifter / transporter	200 kg, 2,000 mm lift	£7,040.04
LTML164	Warehouse lifter / transporter	200 kg, 2,300 mm lift	£7,608.90

What does a lift table cost in the UK?

This is the question the search results dodge, so here is the whole market — including the parts of it we do not serve.

£180 – £400: manual scissor lift trolleys, 100–350 kg. A small hydraulic scissor lift trolley with a foot pump, a platform roughly 700 × 450 mm and a rated capacity of 150 kg or so. Sold by the DIY and tool trade as well as the handling trade. It is a genuinely useful piece of kit for a workshop bench feed or a van load, and it is not a tier we sell. If a 150 kg manual lift table is what you need, buy one from a tool supplier and spend the difference elsewhere.

£400 – £900: better manual and entry electric, 350–800 kg. Double scissor mechanisms for extra lift height, braked castors, better welds and a longer warranty. Still predominantly imported. Again, not a tier we stock.

£1,400 – £3,800: the engineered tier — where this range starts. A 1,000 kg mobile lift table, a 1,000 kg or 2,000 kg static electric lift table, a self-levelling pallet lifter, or a purpose-built positioner. UK-manufactured, EN 1570 or EN 1757-2 compliant, and built to be used every day for years rather than a few times a month. Our range runs £1,440.36 to £3,756.24 in this band.

£4,000 and up: multi-function lifters, tandem tables and bespoke. Warehouse lifters and transporters that lift, move and position in one machine (£5,582.28 – £7,608.90 here), high-capacity tandem tables, pit-mounted installations and specials. At this end you are buying a process, not a table.

The honest headline: the £200 table and the £2,900 table are not the same product at different quality levels — they are different capacities. A £200 unit lifts 150 kg. Our entry static table lifts 1,000 kg. Compare like for like before you conclude that one supplier is expensive.

Scissor lift tables: we stock one configuration, and it is a double scissor

A scissor lift table raises a platform on a crossed-arm linkage driven by a hydraulic ram. Two things separate the models.

Single versus double scissor — and what that means for this page. A single scissor gives a modest lift, enough to bring a pallet or tote from floor level to bench height. A double scissor stacks two linkages so the platform travels roughly twice as far in the same footprint, which is what you want for feeding a high workstation or transferring between levels. We do not stock a single-scissor lift table. There is exactly one orderable mobile scissor lift table in this range — the MLTD100Y double scissor lift trolley, 1,000 kg, £1,512.24 — and if a single-scissor machine is what your process needs, this is not the range for it. The manufacturer's literature names winch-operated single-scissor models (WLT30/50Y); they are not configurations you can order from us, so we are not going to describe them as though they were.

Mobile versus static. A mobile lift table — sometimes listed as a lift cart or a scissor lift trolley — runs on castors so the load travels with the table. The VULCAN range is mobile on two fixed and two swivel braked castors with wheel guards and complies with EN 1570:2011. The MLTD100Y — the one configuration you can order — is raised by pump-action foot pedal and lowered by foot pedal. The hand-operated release trigger and the winch described in the manufacturer's range literature belong to models we do not stock.

A static lift table is bolted or set in place and powered electrically. The GPC static range complies with BS EN 1570 and BS EN 60204-1 and carries a remote power system with an electronic control box offering up, down and emergency buttons. Published figures: lifting speed 42 mm per second under load, lift time 18 seconds, 0.75 kW mains-operated motor, raised platform height 760 mm, lowered platform height 82 mm. The PSL82U is the same machine with a U-shaped platform cut out to 1,050 mm long × 585 mm wide, so a pallet truck can wheel a pallet straight over the platform and reverse out — this is the model people are looking for when they search for a scissor lift for pallets or a pallet lifting table. PSL105F is the 2,000 kg version.

The U-shaped platform is free, and almost nobody publishes that. PSL80F (full platform) and PSL82U (U platform) are £2,902.86 each — identical to the penny. The cut-out is not an option premium, so the decision is purely about how the load arrives: take the U platform unless the load is non-palletised or the whole deck has to carry it, because a hand pallet truck you already own then becomes the loading method at no extra cost. Going from 1,000 kg to 2,000 kg (PSL105F) adds £853.38, or 29.4% — capacity costs money here; the platform shape does not.

Mobile versus static, priced at matched capacity: £2,902.86 against £1,512.24. The static table is 1.92× the mobile trolley for the same 1,000 kg — a £1,390.62 difference that buys you mains-electric operation and a 760 mm powered lift, and costs you the ability to move the load. If the table stays in one place all day, that is money well spent. If it does not, the MLTD100Y does the lifting for just over half the price.

Is it law to wear a harness in a scissor lift? The distinction that matters

This question turns up constantly against lift table searches, and it is being asked about the wrong machine. Two different products share almost the same name:

• A scissor lift table — everything on this page — is a load-lifting device. Nobody rides on it. It is work equipment under PUWER, and lifting equipment under LOLER, so it needs suitable inspection and thorough examination — but harness questions do not arise, because there is no operator on the platform.
• A scissor lift in the access sense is a mobile elevating work platform (MEWP) that carries a person to height. That is where harness policy, familiarisation and the Work at Height Regulations 2005 apply, and it is a hire-and-train conversation, not a table purchase.

Never stand or ride on a lift table. It is not rated, guarded or interlocked for carrying people, and doing so is the single most common serious misuse of this equipment. If you need to get a person to height safely, look at warehouse steps and access platforms for low-level work, or hire a MEWP for anything higher.

What are the common problems with lift tables?

A fair question, and one no product page answers. In practice the recurring faults are these:

• Off-centre loading. A rated capacity assumes the load sits centrally on the platform. Load one end and you concentrate force through one side of the scissor linkage. This is the leading cause of premature wear, bent arms and drifting platforms.
• Slow settling under load. A hydraulic table that gradually sinks is usually a seal or a check-valve issue, not a scrap-it problem — but it must be taken out of service until it is fixed, because a table that creeps is a table that can trap a hand.
• Debris in the scissor mechanism. Timber offcuts, banding, shrink wrap and dust in the linkage will jam a table or damage a ram. This is exactly why the PLL1312 pallet level loader is specified with a bellows skirt for dusty environments.
• Castor damage on mobile tables. A mobile table is only as good as its floor. Rough concrete, expansion joints and dock plates destroy castors, and a table with a seized castor gets dragged, which loads the frame sideways.
• Skipped thorough examination. Lifting equipment needs a documented examination regime under LOLER. It is the paperwork that gets skipped, and it is the paperwork an insurer asks for after an incident.

What are the alternatives to a lift table?

Sometimes a lift table is the wrong answer. The honest alternatives:

• You only need the top of the pallet at a constant height while picking. Use a pallet level loader, not a lift table — it self-levels with no controls to operate.
• You only need to rotate the pallet, not raise it. A PalletDisc turntable removes the walking and twisting for a fraction of the cost of a powered table.
• You need to move the load as well as lift it. A pallet stacker or a VULCAN mini lifter lifts and travels; a lift table does not travel under load in any meaningful way.
• You need to get pallets on and off a vehicle. That is a powered pallet truck, a dock leveller or a ramp, not a table.
• The real problem is the workbench height. Sometimes the fix is an adjustable bench rather than a lifting machine — see our guide to workbench height and ergonomics and the workshop storage range.
• You lift heavy things occasionally, not repeatedly. Occasional lifting is often better solved with a hoist or by re-planning the task. Our guide to manual handling equipment and the MHOR duties works through the avoid–assess–reduce hierarchy properly.

Capacity: 500 kg, 1,000 kg and 2,000 kg

Buyers search by capacity, so here is where the numbers land.

Up to 500 kg covers most bench-feed, assembly and packing work — totes, cartons, part-filled pallets. The trade market is well served here at £200–£900, and the VULCAN electric mini lifters in this range cover 100 kg, 150 kg and 400 kg where you also need the load to travel.

1,000 kg is the standard full-pallet figure and where this range starts: MLTD100Y mobile at £1,512.24, PSL80F and PSL82U static at £2,902.86. A loaded UK standard pallet frequently sits between 500 kg and 1,000 kg — see our guide to UK pallet sizes if you are sizing a platform.

2,000 kg is heavy pallet, drum and machine-part territory: PSL105F at £3,756.24. Above this you move into tandem and bespoke tables.

One caveat that applies to every capacity: a rating is a centred, evenly distributed figure. The same principle governs racking and shelving, and it is explained properly in our guide to load ratings, UDL and SWL.

Pallet lifters and pallet level loaders

What is a pallet lifter called? Unhelpfully, several things. "Pallet lifter", "pallet riser", "pallet level loader", "self-levelling pallet loader" and "pallet positioner" all describe the same category of equipment, and the trade uses them interchangeably. The machine that actually picks a pallet up off the floor and carries it is a pallet truck or a stacker — a different product entirely, covered on our pallet truck range.

How do pallet lifters work? A pallet level loader is a spring-set scissor platform with no controls at all. You place a full pallet on it and the springs compress under the weight so the platform sits near floor level. As each layer is picked off, the load lightens and the springs push the platform up by exactly the amount removed — so the top of the stack stays at roughly the same working height throughout. Nobody presses a button, and there is nothing to power.

Two configurations are listed here. PLL1211 is the standard pallet level loader at £2,255.28. PLL1312 adds a bellows skirt — a flexible dust cover that encloses the scissor mechanism — at £2,734.38, and is the one to specify for timber processing, food production, foundries or anywhere debris will otherwise end up in the linkage. GPC does not publish a load rating for either model, so we are not going to quote one; ask us with your pallet weight before ordering.

PalletDisc rotating positioner

The PalletDisc (PLD1100, £1,440.36) is a low-profile turntable that sits on the floor and rotates the pallet as it is built or picked, so the operator stays in one place instead of walking round the load. It removes the twisting element of palletising, which is the part of the movement that causes back injuries, and it pairs with a pallet level loader so the stack is both at the right height and facing the right way. Lead time is 10 days.

VULCAN mini lifters

Where the load has to be lifted and moved, a mini lifter does the job of a small stacker in a much tighter footprint. The VULCAN range conforms to EN 1757-2, comes with a removable work platform (taken off with simple tools, leaving two forks underneath), and runs on 125 mm steering wheels with foot guards and 75 mm rollers. All three orderable mini lifters are electric and carry automatic electronic overload protection. The manufacturer's range also lists a hand-winch manual model with an auto brake; it is not an orderable configuration here, so do not budget for one. Power is a 24 V / 20 Ah battery with a built-in charger.

Listed configurations: MLE04Y at 100 kg (£1,624.20), MLE03Y at 150 kg (£1,667.64), and EL1200Y at 400 kg with a 1,200 mm lift height (£1,890.00) — hard-chromium plated frame, overload protection, braking, UKCA marked and plated. Changeable options are available across the range including a bevelled platform, drum and roll turner, roll and coil handler and roller bed; call us for details rather than assuming a given attachment is in stock.

The mini-lifter ladder is the best-value line on this page, and it runs the opposite way to instinct: four times the capacity costs 16.4% more money. MLE04Y at 100 kg is £1,624.20 — £16.24 per kilogram. MLE03Y at 150 kg is £1,667.64 — £11.12 per kilogram. EL1200Y at 400 kg is £1,890.00 — £4.73 per kilogram, which is three and a half times better value per kilogram than the 100 kg machine for £265.80 more. It is also the only one of the three with a published lift height (1,200 mm). Unless floor space or weight genuinely forces the smaller frame, buy the 400 kg machine.

Warehouse lifters and transporters

For production lines and order-picking floors where one machine has to lift, move and position all day, the GPC warehouse lifter/transporter range conforms to EN 1757-2 with all controls mounted within reach of the operator and attachments changed using simple tools. It runs on 100 mm steering wheels with foot pedal brakes and 80 mm tandem rollers, with a 300 mm load centre and a 24 V / 0.37 kW lift motor. The built-in battery charges from any 13 amp socket — 2 × 12 V / 17 Ah on 100 kg models, 2 × 12 V / 40 Ah on 200 kg models.

Six configurations run from LTML086 (100 kg, 1,500 mm lift, £5,582.28) to LTML164 (200 kg, 2,300 mm lift, £7,608.90). One manufacturer's note worth reading before you order: load capacities may alter depending on which accessories are fitted — the headline figure is the bare machine.

Heavy duty drum lifters

The GPC heavy duty drum lifter grips a drum for raising, tipping and positioning so nobody has to manhandle it. Two lift heights: DLL03Z at 500 mm (£1,554.30) and DLL04Z at 800 mm, listed for plastic or steel drums (£1,900.02). A full 205-litre steel drum is well over 200 kg, which puts it outside safe manual handling by any measure. If you are handling drums regularly, the lifter is one part of the answer and containment is the other — see drum storage, spill containment and our guide to storing oil drums safely.

Do you need a licence to use a lift table?

No — there is no statutory licence for a lift table, a pallet lifter or a pedestrian stacker in the UK. There is no equivalent of a driving licence for this equipment. What there is instead is a legal duty that people are often surprised by: under PUWER 1998 an employer must ensure anyone using work equipment has received adequate information, instruction and training. "Adequate" is judged against the actual machine and the actual job, and an accident investigation will ask for the record.

Because these are lifting appliances, LOLER 1998 also applies: equipment must be of adequate strength and stability, positioned to minimise risk, and subject to thorough examination by a competent person at the required intervals, with records kept. Add daily pre-use checks — platform condition, hydraulics for leaks, castors and brakes, controls and emergency stop, and the guarding around the scissor mechanism.

The same rules apply to related equipment. Our guides to using a pallet truck safely and choosing between a pallet stacker and a pallet truck cover the same ground for those machines.

Lift table hire — and why we do not offer it

"Lift table hire", "scissor lift table hire" and "pallet lifter hire" are among the most common related searches on these terms, so it is worth saying plainly: we sell this equipment, we do not hire it.

Hire is genuinely the right answer for a one-off — a site move, a single installation, a short contract. Plant and handling hire companies will quote you by the week. Buying starts to make sense when the equipment is part of a daily process rather than a project, because the injury the table prevents is a permanent cost and the table is not.

What we sell — and what we do not

We do sell: UK-manufactured GPC and VULCAN lift tables, static electric lift tables to 2,000 kg, pallet level loaders with and without bellows, the PalletDisc positioner, mini lifters, warehouse lifters/transporters and drum lifters — all new, all with published compliance standards.

We do not sell: the £180–£900 imported manual scissor trolley tier (buy it from a tool supplier — it is a good buy for what it is); second-hand or refurbished lift tables; scissor lifts in the MEWP or access sense; goods lifts, mezzanine lifts or anything requiring building work — though we do supply mezzanine flooring; pit-mounted or fully bespoke tables; and hire. We also do not carry out LOLER thorough examinations — that needs an independent competent person.

Choosing the right machine

• Keeping the top of a pallet at picking height: pallet level loader (PLL1211, or PLL1312 with bellows if the environment is dusty), ideally with a PalletDisc.
• Raising a full pallet to a fixed working height, in one place: static lift table — PSL82U if a pallet truck needs to drive over the platform, PSL80F for a full deck, PSL105F at 2,000 kg.
• Raising loads at more than one location: mobile double scissor lift trolley (MLTD100Y, 1,000 kg).
• Lifting and travelling with light loads: VULCAN mini lifter — 100 kg, 150 kg or 400 kg.
• Continuous multi-task lifting, moving and positioning: warehouse lifter/transporter.
• Drum handling: heavy duty drum lifter, 500 mm or 800 mm lift.
• Moving full pallets around the building: not a lift table — see manual pallet trucks, electric pallet trucks and powered stackers.

Not sure which way to go? Our article on choosing a scissor lift table works through the decision in more depth, and manual versus electric pallet trucks covers the neighbouring choice. For moving loaded cages and trolleys rather than pallets, look at roll containers, trucks and trolleys and electric tugs.