Stop work authority (SWA) is a company policy that lets any worker halt a task they believe could seriously hurt someone, without asking permission and without being punished. No OSHA standard requires an SWA program. The legal floor is narrower: 29 CFR 1977.12 protects refusing work only when there is a real danger of death or serious injury and no time to fix it another way.
Most of what you will read about stop work authority treats it as an OSHA rule. It is not one. That matters, because the gap between "OSHA protects this" and "our policy promises this" is exactly where a crew member gets disciplined for doing the right thing. This guide covers what the law actually says, how to write a policy people will use, and a free template with a stop work log and wallet cards.
Free Stop Work Authority Policy Template
None of the top-ranking pages on this topic give you anything to download, so here is a four-page template you can adapt in an afternoon:
Download the Word template (.docx) · Download the printable PDF
| Page | What it covers |
|---|---|
| 1 | Purpose, who the policy covers, when to stop, and a no-retaliation commitment |
| 2 | The seven-step stop and restart procedure, who can restart work, and training reminders |
| 3 | A stop work log: date, task, who stopped it, the hazard, the fix, and who restarted it |
| 4 | Four wallet cards to print on card stock and hand out at orientation |
Fill in the bracketed names and job titles before you roll it out. A policy that says "your supervisor" without naming who that is on each site tends to stall the first time someone uses it.
Is Stop Work Authority an OSHA Requirement?
No. We searched the full text of OSHA's standards (29 CFR) through the official eCFR search, and the phrase "stop work authority" does not appear in any of them. There is no general OSHA standard that requires a stop work program.
A handful of OSHA standards do require a specific person to have the power to stop a specific job:
- Cranes near power lines, 29 CFR 1926.1410(h). When equipment works closer than the Table A clearance, one person must direct the procedures and "must have the authority to stop work at any time to ensure safety."
- Shipyard fire watches, 29 CFR 1915.504(c)(2)(iii). Employees on fire watch must be "authorized to stop work if necessary and restore safe conditions within the hot work area."
Outside OSHA, two federal rules spell stop work authority out by name. The Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement requires it for offshore oil and gas operators under 30 CFR 250.1930, and the Department of Energy's worker safety rule for its contractors, 10 CFR 851.20, gives workers the right to stop work when they find imminently dangerous conditions. If you have heard SWA described as mandatory, it was probably by someone who came from one of those industries.
For everyone else, SWA is something you choose to adopt. That is not a reason to skip it. It just means the policy, not the regulation, is what defines how it works on your sites.
What the Law Does Protect: The Right to Refuse Unsafe Work
The federal protection that sits underneath any stop work policy is Section 11(c) of the OSH Act, which bars employers from retaliating against workers who exercise their rights under the Act. OSHA's own interpretation of how that applies to refusing work is in 29 CFR 1977.12, and it is narrower than most people expect.
Paragraph (b)(1) starts from the opposite position: as a general matter, the Act gives employees no right to walk off the job because of potential unsafe conditions. Paragraph (b)(2) then carves out the exception. A refusal is protected when all of these are true:
- The worker refuses in good faith.
- There is no reasonable alternative to doing the task.
- A reasonable person in the same situation would conclude there is a real danger of death or serious injury.
- There is not enough time to get the danger fixed through normal enforcement channels, such as asking OSHA to inspect.
- Where possible, the worker asked the employer to fix the condition and could not get it fixed.
A worker who believes they were punished for a protected refusal can file a retaliation complaint with OSHA. Under 29 CFR 1977.15(d), that complaint must be filed within 30 days of the retaliation.
Here is the practical gap. A worker who stops a job because a trench wall looks wrong is often not facing the "insufficient time, real danger of death" test that 1977.12 describes. They are being careful. The law may not protect that stop. A written stop work policy is how you protect it, by promising in writing that nobody is punished for a good-faith stop even when the hazard turns out to be smaller than it looked.
Stop Work Authority vs. a Stop Work Order
These get mixed up in search results, so it is worth separating them:
| Stop work authority | Stop work order | |
|---|---|---|
| Who issues it | Any worker on the task | A client, contracting officer, building department or government agency |
| Why | An immediate safety hazard | Contract, permit, payment, code or legal issues, sometimes safety |
| How long it lasts | Until the hazard is controlled, often minutes | Until the issuing party lifts it, often days or weeks |
| What governs it | Your company policy | The contract, permit or regulation behind it |
The Seven-Step Stop and Restart Process
The template uses this sequence. It is deliberately short, because a process that needs a laminated flowchart will not get used at the edge of a roof.
- Stop. Say "stop work" clearly and get everyone on the task to pause.
- Make it safe. Bring the task to a safe stop. Do not leave a suspended load hanging or a machine half-disassembled. If the hazard involves stored energy, that may mean locking out the energy source before anyone looks closer.
- Notify. Tell the person in charge of the work right away.
- Talk it through. The person who stopped the work and the person in charge look at the hazard together.
- Fix it. Put the controls in place. If it cannot be fixed now, the work stays stopped.
- Restart. Only the named person restarts the work, and only after the hazard is controlled.
- Record it. Log the stop before the end of the shift.
Step 2 is the one most policies skip. "Stop immediately" sounds right until the task is lowering a pallet off a forklift mast. A sudden stop can create its own hazard, so the policy should say to bring the task to a safe state, not freeze in place.
Who Should Be Allowed to Restart Work
Anyone can stop the work. Restarting it should be narrower. The offshore rule is a useful model here even if you are nowhere near the ocean: 30 CFR 250.1930 makes the person in charge responsible for stopping work in an orderly way, lets work resume only when the designated authority determines the danger no longer exists, and requires that decision to be documented in writing.
For a small contractor, that translates to three lines in your policy:
- One named person restarts work, usually the foreman or supervisor running the task, with a named backup.
- For high-risk work such as confined spaces, energized equipment or work at height, a second sign-off from your safety lead.
- The person who called the stop agrees it is safe. If they still do not, it goes up to the policy owner before anyone restarts.
That last line is the one that builds trust. If a supervisor can overrule a stop on the spot, the crew learns that stopping work is a formality.
Why Crews Don't Use Stop Work Authority (and How to Fix It)
A policy on paper changes nothing if nobody uses it. The reasons people don't stop work are predictable:
- Fear of being wrong. Nobody wants to halt a pour and find out the hazard was nothing. Put "even if the hazard turns out to be smaller than it looked" in writing, and say it out loud at orientation.
- Rank. A second-week laborer rarely stops a 20-year foreman. Say plainly that authority does not depend on job title or time on the job.
- Schedule pressure. If the first thing a supervisor asks after a stop is "how long will this take," people stop stopping. Thank the person first.
- Nobody knows the steps. Wallet cards and a ten-minute toolbox talk fix this. Our talk ideas for construction crews already include one on the right to refuse unsafe work, which pairs well with it.
- Stops disappear. If a stop is never mentioned again, it looks like it didn't matter. Share stops, without names if needed, at the next safety meeting.
One more habit borrowed from the offshore rule: 30 CFR 250.1930 requires the stop work statement in every job safety analysis. You don't have to follow that rule, but it is a cheap way to keep SWA in front of the crew every day. If you are building JSAs from scratch, our JSA template with room for it is a starting point.
Where Stop Work Authority Fits With Your Other Programs
Stop work authority is a reflex, not a plan. It covers the moment someone sees a hazard on a single task. It does not replace the documents that cover bigger events. When the alarm sounds and everyone leaves the building, that is your emergency action plan, not a stop work call.
The log matters more than it looks. Each stop is a hazard someone caught before it hurt anyone, which is the same information a near-miss report captures. A run of stops on the same task tells you where your planning is weak, and a file of caught hazards is good evidence that your safety program is doing something.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is stop work authority?
Stop work authority (SWA) is a company policy that lets any worker halt a task they believe could seriously hurt someone, without needing a supervisor's permission first and without being punished for it. Work restarts only after the hazard is checked and controlled.
Does OSHA require a stop work authority program?
No. The phrase does not appear in OSHA's standards in 29 CFR, and no general OSHA rule requires a formal program. A few standards require a named person to have authority to stop work, such as the person directing crane work near power lines under 1926.1410(h). Offshore oil and gas operators are required to have one under a different agency's rule, 30 CFR 250.1930.
Who has stop work authority on a jobsite?
Under a good policy, everyone: every employee regardless of job title, plus subcontractors, temporary workers and visitors. Restarting the work is different. That should rest with one named person, usually the supervisor or foreman in charge of the task.
Can an employee be fired for refusing unsafe work?
It depends on the circumstances. Under 29 CFR 1977.12, OSHA protects a worker who refuses in good faith when there is a real danger of death or serious injury, no reasonable alternative, not enough time to get it fixed through normal channels, and, where possible, the employer was asked to fix it first. Outside those conditions the federal rule does not protect a refusal, though a company stop work policy can promise more.
Who can restart work after a stop?
The person your policy names, usually the supervisor in charge of the task, and only after the hazard has been controlled. For high-risk work, many policies also require a safety lead to sign off. The person who called the stop should agree it is safe before the work restarts.
What is the difference between stop work authority and a stop work order?
Stop work authority is a worker's right under a company safety policy to pause an unsafe task. A stop work order is a formal instruction from a client, contracting officer or government agency to halt work on a contract or project, often for reasons that have nothing to do with safety.
Stops happening, but nothing written down? With Safety Team Technologies, the worker who called the stop can log it from a phone with a photo, and you get a timestamped record with the location and hazard type instead of a story someone half-remembers on Friday.
See how a stop gets logged or test it on one crew for a month.
This guide summarizes federal rules as published at the time of review and is general information, not legal advice. State plans and local rules can add protections, so check the rules that apply to your sites before you adopt a policy.
