Access and positioning procedures with the aid of ropes are legitimized as work equipment for temporary work at elevated workplaces according to the Ordinance on Industrial Safety and Health. The regulation is issued jointly on the proposal of the European Commission and the Council and must be implemented nationally in the member states. As it is a binding legal act, the described minimum requirements for work with the aid of ropes must be complied with. Although the supporting technical rules and other publications dealing with rope access techniques describe the recognized rules of technology and trigger the presumption of conformity, they are often only recommendatory in nature and do not rule out other solutions that are at least as safe. In addition, the dual occupational safety and health system in Germany is characterized not only by a large number of ordinances, rules and standards, but also by the strict separation of the regulatory institutions. In addition, there are private technical regulations, as described by the certifying associations in their safety guidelines. These are exclusively of a recommendatory nature and yet certificates from the established certification bodies, such as FISAT, IRATA, SOFT or ANETVA, are frequently requested when contracts are awarded in which rope access technicians are to be deployed. We would like to approach the questions of standards and the meaning of a qualification certificate issued by an external certification body from the direction of common sense and simplification for employers and employees. However, it is not possible for us to provide a jurisprudential interpretation of the various writings or a legal assessment of specific issues.