You are looking for a cleaner, a warehouse worker, someone for order picking. No qualification required, limited training, semi-skilled work. And still the position has been open for months. That is not a quirk of your business, it is the national norm — and the number behind it surprises most employers.
156 days — and specialist roles sit at 157
The Federal Employment Agency (Bundesagentur für Arbeit, BA) measures the time-to-fill as the period between the employer’s desired start date and the day a registered vacancy is actually withdrawn. For April 2025 to March 2026, the picture by skill level looks like this:
- Skilled workers: 183 days
- All skill levels combined: 165 days
- Specialists: 157 days
- Helper and semi-skilled roles: 156 days
- Experts: 109 days
Source: Federal Employment Agency, April 2025 to March 2026.
The interesting part sits in the middle. Between a helper role and a specialist role — a position that typically requires a master craftsman’s qualification or a bachelor’s degree — the gap is exactly one day. The widespread assumption that helper roles can be filled quickly because the candidate pool is larger does not survive contact with the data.
156 days is roughly five months. Not quite half a year, but close enough to break your workforce planning if you budgeted six weeks.
More applicants does not mean faster hiring
The obvious explanation would be: semi-skilled work has a large candidate pool, so filling it should be quick. That expectation is precisely what creates the planning gap businesses later stumble over.
A larger pool of people who could in principle do the job only shortens the time-to-fill if those people are also available, reachable and willing — in the right place, for the right shift, on the terms offered. That is exactly where cleaning and logistics run into trouble. The work happens early in the morning, late in the evening or at weekends, often at changing sites, frequently part-time. Those who would qualify are usually already employed — and they do not move for fifty cents an hour.
Then there is the drop-out rate within the process itself. In helper roles, cancellations shortly before the start date and no-shows on day one are more common than in skilled positions. Each of these does not reset the clock to zero, but it does set it a long way back — and repetitions like these are part of what makes up those 156 days.
The practical conclusion is uncomfortable: the lever is rarely the job ad. It is the question of which pool you are drawing from at all — and whether that pool is deep enough to absorb drop-outs.
What this means for cleaning, logistics and warehousing
In its ranking of shortage occupations by time-to-fill, the BA lists mainly construction and finishing trades — interior fit-out and drywall leads with 301 days. Cleaning, warehousing and transport do not appear among those top values. That is not a contradiction, it is a question of choosing the right benchmark.
A large share of the work in building cleaning, warehouse operations and order picking falls statistically under the skill level helper and semi-skilled roles. The benchmark for your planning is therefore not the occupational ranking but the figure for that level: 156 days. Anyone planning a cleaning or warehouse position plans with five months — or plans wrong.
Broken down by economic sector, the BA additionally shows that construction sits well above the average across all sectors. For businesses providing cleaning and logistics as a service to developers or industrial clients, the shortage therefore bites twice: on their own vacancies and on their clients’ side.
Helper, skilled worker, specialist, expert — the distinction decides the legal route
These four terms get used interchangeably in everyday conversation. Legally and statistically they mean different things, and for international hiring they determine both the duration and the admissibility of the procedure.
Helper and semi-skilled roles describe work that requires no formal vocational qualification and is learned on the job. Examples are cleaners, warehouse assistants or nursing auxiliaries.
Skilled workers perform specialised work on the basis of a completed vocational qualification — for instance chefs, bakers or childcare workers.
Specialists carry out complex tasks, typically at master craftsman, technician or bachelor’s level.
Experts take on highly complex tasks equivalent to at least a four-year degree.
This classification is not word-play. Describing semi-skilled work as a skilled position in a job advertisement or towards the authorities does not speed up the procedure — it makes it contestable. Conversely, classifying it correctly as a helper role opens a legal route that is not available for skilled positions in the same form.
What five months of an unfilled helper role cost
The cost of a vacancy rarely appears where people look for it. The saved salary sits on the credit side — everything else sits against it:
- Overtime and premiums for the existing team absorbing the gap
- Temporary staffing or subcontracting at hourly rates well above your own wage level
- Lost revenue where orders cannot be accepted or areas cannot be serviced
- Turnover within the existing team, because sustained overload pushes the next people out
- Repeated advertising and selection costs across five months
The last point is the underestimated one. Five months of vacancy is not one search but, in practice, several consecutive ones — each with new advertising costs, new screening and new interviews.
A rough calculation shows how quickly the sum grows. Assume a full-time cleaning position is bridged through temporary staffing and the external hourly rate sits ten euros above your own personnel costs. At roughly 160 hours a month that is about 1,600 euros in additional costs per month, and around 8,000 euros over five months — before a single advertisement has been placed or an hour of overtime paid within the existing team. If the gap is absorbed internally instead, the amount merely shifts: external costs become premiums, sick days and, in the worse case, a second vacancy.
These figures are deliberately calculated as an assumption, not as a survey. Your own hourly rate, your shift structure and your order situation will produce a different result — but rarely a smaller one.
Work through your own case: the vacancy cost calculator on miotalent.de uses your figures and shows what an open position costs your business per month.
The route for semi-skilled work: the Western Balkans regulation
For semi-skilled work there is an access route that does not exist in this form for skilled positions. Under Section 26 (2) of the German Employment Regulation (Beschäftigungsverordnung, BeschV) — commonly known as the Western Balkans regulation — nationals of Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Serbia may work in Germany without formal recognition of their qualification. The regulation applies to non-regulated occupations; regulated professions such as medical and certain healthcare roles are excluded.
The basic requirement is a concrete job offer on standard market terms together with the approval of the Federal Employment Agency. The visa is applied for exclusively at the competent German mission in the applicant’s home country; an application from within Germany is not possible.
And now the part you should know before you plan: the regulation is capped at an annual quota of 50,000 approvals. It was doubled from 25,000 on 1 June 2024 and made permanent at the same time. A reduction of this quota is under political discussion. Two practical consequences follow. First, a quota that fills up over the course of the year is an argument for starting early and against waiting. Second, the Western Balkans regulation is a reliable route but not an indefinitely plannable one — anyone building an entire workforce strategy on it is building on a figure that is politically movable.
This information is provided for orientation and does not constitute legal advice.
How an international placement actually runs
From the first enquiry to the first working day, a properly handled process takes around four months. The sequence in seven steps:
- Requirements analysis. You submit your staffing requirements. The active search begins once the complete requirements analysis and the signed placement agreement are in place.
- Candidate sourcing and pre-qualification. Around two to four weeks.
- Candidate presentation. Profiles as a document pack, with a video or interview option on request. Feedback requested within 14 calendar days.
- Document collection and legalisation.
- Authority procedure. Submission to the German authorities; work permit approximately six to eight weeks.
- Visa procedure and flight booking. Approximately four weeks.
- Arrival, registration, start of work.
Anyone promising you a placement in 48 hours is not describing this route. Authority and visa procedures can be prepared and managed properly, but they cannot be shortened.
Working backwards: when you have to start
Combine the two figures and the planning becomes unambiguous. A helper role stays open for 156 days on the national average. An international placement takes around four months from contract, so roughly 120 days.
If you need a cleaning or warehouse worker in your business by 1 January, the starting point for the international route is early September. If you are planning for 1 March, you start in November. Anyone beginning the search in December and expecting to be staffed in January has effectively already postponed the decision.
The honest addition: both are average values. An authority procedure can run faster, an embassy appointment can shift. So do not plan to the day — plan with a buffer, and above all earlier than it currently feels urgent.
What you can do now
First check which of your open positions are genuinely semi-skilled and which require a vocational qualification. That classification determines both the route and the duration. Then work backwards from the date on which the person needs to be in your business.
If you want to know which route works for your specific positions: Free initial consultation — we will call you back, whenever suits you.
Further reading:
- Shortage occupations 2026: the longest times to fill
- 301 days: the cost of a vacant position in construction
Sources
- Federal Employment Agency: Time-to-fill of job vacancies by skill level in Germany, April 2025 to March 2026. 2026. de.statista.com (accessed 20 August 2026)
- Federal Employment Agency: Time-to-fill of job vacancies by economic sector in Germany. 2026. de.statista.com (accessed 20 August 2026)
- Federal Employment Agency: Shortage occupation analysis. 2026. statistik.arbeitsagentur.de (accessed 20 August 2026)
- Federal Employment Agency: Living and working in Germany — Western Balkans regulation. 2026. arbeitsagentur.de (accessed 20 August 2026)
