Permit to work: hot work, confined space and working at heights permits, with a free template

A permit to work is a written authorisation for one high-risk task, in one place, for a set period. It names the hazards, the controls that must be in place before work starts, the people responsible, and the sign-off that closes it. The free Humanz templates below cover all three in one Excel workbook, no email gate.

A permit is not a risk assessment and not a procedure. It is the gate between them: the JSA or SWMS works out how the job will be done, and the permit confirms the controls are in place on the day, signed by a named person before anyone lights a torch or climbs through a manway. This is general information, not safety advice: the WHS regulator where the work happens is the authority, and a site or principal contractor’s own permit system takes precedence over anything here.

Which permits the law names, and which are site rules

Only one of the three is required by name. The model WHS Regulations, adopted everywhere except Victoria (whose OHS law has its own confined space requirements), require a confined space entry permit before a worker is directed into a confined space. Hot work and working at heights permits are controls a business chooses to meet a broader duty, and sites, principal contractors and insurers require them as a condition of working there.

Hot work permit

WorkSafe Queensland’s controlling fire and explosion risks page defines hot work as any process involving grinding, welding, brazing, oxy cutting, heat treatment or any similar process that generates heat or continuous streams of sparks, and describes a hot work permit system as one that controls when and how hot work is done where flammable or combustible materials are present. It points to AS 1674.1, AS 1940 and AS 2865 for more on permit systems. No regulation requires the permit by name; the regulation requires that an ignition source is not introduced into a hazardous atmosphere, and the permit is the paperwork that shows you checked.

The same page notes that grinding can throw hot metal shavings considerable distances, which is the logic of the permit: the hazard is not the weld, it is everything a spark can reach. A hot work permit asks:

• What, where, for how long. One job, one location, a stated period. “Welding, workshop, all week” is not a permit.
• What can burn within range. Combustibles, flammable liquids and gases, dust, a drum or tank that has not been cleaned (a common cause of serious incidents, the page says), the floor below, and what was done about each: removed, covered, wet down or shielded.
• Isolations. Fire detection and suppression isolated for the work, with who reinstates it; product and gas lines isolated where the work is on or near them.
• Gas testing. Near flammables or on a container that has held them, a test before starting, with reading, time and tester. WorkSafe Queensland treats an atmosphere above 5% of the lower explosive limit as hazardous.
• The fire watch. A named person whose only job is to watch for fire during the work and for a set period after, because hot work fires tend to start after the welder has packed up.
• Signatures. Issuer, person in charge of the work, fire watch. Close-out is the fire watch confirming the area is cold at the end of the watch period.

Welding in or on a confined space is both permits at once, each referencing the other.

Confined space entry permit

The Queensland Work Health and Safety Regulation 2011, which carries the model WHS Regulations, defines a confined space as an enclosed or partially enclosed space that is not designed or intended primarily to be occupied by a person, is at normal atmospheric pressure while someone is in it, and is or is likely to be a risk to health and safety from an atmosphere without a safe oxygen level, from contaminants that may cause fire or explosion, from harmful concentrations of airborne contaminants, or from engulfment. Tanks, pits, silos, sewers, some trenches and crawl spaces are the usual suspects; WorkSafe Queensland’s guidance adds manure pits, grain storage and wells near running engines.

Regulation 67 names the permit. A business must not direct a worker to enter a confined space to carry out work unless it has issued a confined space entry permit for that work. The permit must be completed by a competent person, be in writing, and state the space, the names of the persons permitted to enter, the period of the work, and the measures to control risk. It must contain space for an acknowledgement that the work is complete and everyone has left, and when the work is done the business must make sure that is true and that the competent person signs it.

The controls must be based on the written risk assessment regulation 66 requires and include the system of work under regulation 69: continuous communication with the worker from outside, and a standby person nearby monitoring conditions and, if practicable, watching the work. Regulation 74 adds first aid and rescue procedures, established, practised and started from outside the space. SafeWork NSW’s confined spaces page puts the standby rule bluntly: the stand-by person must continuously monitor conditions from outside and must never enter to attempt a rescue. It also says atmospheric testing should be done before anyone enters, and that an example entry permit sits in Annex C of the confined spaces code of practice.

Beyond that minimum, a confined space permit carries the atmosphere test results with time and tester, the isolations and ventilation in place, the standby person and communication channel by name, the rescue arrangement (who, with what gear, from where), and an entry and exit log: the permit names who may enter, the log shows who did.

Keep it afterwards. Regulation 77 requires the permit to be kept at least until the work is completed, the risk assessment for at least 28 days after, and both for at least two years if a notifiable incident occurs in connection with the work. Entrants and standby people also need the training the regulation requires, which most sites evidence with a confined space ticket and a VOC, so the permit and the worker’s record have to meet somewhere.

Working at heights permit

No regulation names a working at heights permit. What the regulations name is the order of controls. Regulation 78 requires that where a fall is reasonably likely to cause injury, the work is done on the ground or on a solid construction so far as reasonably practicable. Regulation 79 sets the sequence if that is not possible: a fall prevention device if reasonably practicable; if not, a work positioning system; if neither, a fall arrest system. Safe Work Australia’s working at heights page gives the examples: barriers, scaffolding and elevating work platforms for prevention; industrial rope access as a positioning system; a safety net or catch platform for arrest. Regulation 80 requires that where a fall arrest system is used, emergency procedures including rescue procedures are established and tested so they are effective. On a construction site, work with a risk of a fall of more than 2 metres is high risk construction work and needs a SWMS first.

A working at heights permit is how a site enforces that sequence per job rather than per policy. The site sets the trigger, and the permit records the location, height and work; the fall control chosen and its place in the hierarchy (the template’s drop-down runs in the regulation’s order, so a permit that lands on fall arrest has to say why the higher options were not reasonably practicable); anchor points and the pre-use inspection of harnesses, lanyards or the EWP; the exclusion zone below, because the thing most likely to fall is a tool; the wind limit and who calls it; the rescue plan, with the gear on site before the work starts; and the competent persons with their tickets, including any high risk work licence the EWP class needs.

The permit lifecycle, and where it goes wrong

All three permits run the same loop, and most permit failures are failures of the loop rather than the form.

1. Request. The person in charge asks for the permit with the job, location and time, and says what else is happening nearby, because the welder’s permit is also the painter’s problem two bays over.
2. Hazard identification. The JSA or SWMS exists or gets written now; the permit references it rather than repeating it. The JSA template guide covers that form and JSA vs SWMS vs Take 5 covers which one the law asks for.
3. Isolations and tests. Locks and tags on, atmosphere tested, fire systems isolated and recorded, before the issuer signs.
4. Authorisation. The issuer walks the job, checks the controls against the permit, and signs. A permit signed in the ute from a description has not met the job.
5. The work, within the permit period, with the standby or fire watch in place throughout.
6. Handover across shifts. The permit closes at shift end or is handed in writing to the next issuer and person in charge, with the standby or fire watch replaced by name. Otherwise nobody is watching for an hour.
7. Handback and close. Everyone out, gear retrieved, isolations removed or recorded as remaining, area confirmed cold, acknowledgement signed, close time in the register.

The common failures are all in that list: the permit signed from the office, the expiry ignored because the job ran long, the standby person who is also the second entrant (which breaches the regulation), the rescue plan that says “call 000”, and the permit never closed, sitting in the register as an open confined space until someone audits.

Download the free permit to work templates

Download the Humanz permit to work templates (Excel, .xlsx). No sign-up, no email gate. It opens in any current version of Excel and imports into Google Sheets (File, then Import).

A spreadsheet is the fallback, not how we would run this. Humanz is a workforce management app, and in the app a permit is a digital form with an approval step: the issuer signs off on a phone, the permit sits against the job, and the register is a report rather than a sheet. We publish this template anyway, free and with no sign-up, because a good sheet beats a blank page and not every crew is ready for software. If yours is, see how Humanz runs site paperwork.

What’s in it

• Hot work permit sheet. Job and location, the hot work being done, the permit period with start and expiry, the fire hazards within range and the controls, the fire watch person and the post-work watch period, isolations, PPE and equipment checks, a gas test block for where it is required, authorisation signatures for the permit issuer, the person in charge of the work and the fire watch, and a close-out block.
• Confined space permit sheet. The space identified, the work, the entry period, the hazards of the space, atmosphere testing results with time and tester, isolations, ventilation, the communication method and standby person, rescue arrangements, a table of entrants with entry and exit times, the permit issuer and entry supervisor sign-off, and the close-out acknowledgement the regulation asks for.
• Working at heights permit sheet. Location and height, the work, the fall-prevention control chosen from a hierarchy drop-down, anchor points and equipment inspection, the exclusion zone below, weather and wind limit, rescue plan, the competent persons named, sign-on and close-out.
• Permit register sheet. One row per permit: type, number, location, issued to, issuer, start, expiry, closed time. An open permit past its expiry turns red, which is the one view a paper permit book never gives you.
• How to use sheet. The instructions in one page, including what the workbook does not do.

What it does not do, plainly. The templates do not know your site, your plant or your atmosphere; the lines are prompts and the content under them is yours. The confined space sheet does not replace a confined space entry permit issued under the site’s or principal contractor’s own system, and where that system exists it wins. None of it is safety advice: the regulator where the work happens is the authority, and the person who signs the permit is the one who has looked at the job.

Where the paper version breaks

A supervisor with a carbon-copy pad, standing at the job, can issue a good permit. The trouble is everything after.

The open permit nobody closed. On paper, a closed permit and an abandoned one look the same until someone reads the whole book. The register sheet fixes that for one site with one book, not for six crews across three sites with a pad each.

The permit is in the site office and the question is on the roster. Thursday’s roster wants to know whether the person booked onto the tank clean holds a current confined space ticket. The answer is in a folder or the supervisor’s memory, and the roster gets built before it comes back.

No way to know who held what when they signed. After an incident the question is whether the entrant, the standby and the issuer were competent on the day. Four signatures and a ticket register in a different cupboard cannot answer that quickly, and the incident report is due meanwhile.

Handover is a verbal. Shift change on paper is “the permit’s on the board”. Who confirmed the standby was replaced, and when, lives nowhere.

Running permits on a phone with Humanz

Humanz is a workforce management platform with a custom form builder, and a permit is one of the forms it is built to carry. Your admin builds each permit once, from the workbook or the site’s own layout: mandatory questions that stop the form submitting with a blank gas test, drop-downs for the control hierarchy, conditional sections that open the gas test block only when the work is near flammables, photo capture for isolation tags, and multiple signatures for the issuer, the person in charge, the standby or fire watch, and the close-out. The crew completes it on their phone at the job, offline if the signal drops, and every submission is timestamped and stored against the job and the worker, with the version of the form they completed.

Then the roster uses the tickets. Confined space entry, working at heights, hot work and welding competencies, VOCs and high risk work licences sit on the worker’s profile with expiry alerts, and compliance rules set per client and per site stop a shift booking a worker whose ticket for the task is missing or expired, so the issuer finds out at rostering time rather than at the manway. Employees, labour hire and subcontractors sit on one roster under the same rules, which matters because the entrant, the standby and the issuer are routinely three different employers. Messages about the job keep their history, so “who confirmed the fire watch was replaced at shift change” is a search. The qualification and induction tracking guide covers the ticket side; the site induction checklist covers telling a worker which permits run on this site.

The limits are the workbook’s limits. Humanz does not issue permits, test atmospheres, assess hazards or decide which control is reasonably practicable; a competent person does that, at the job. It does not use AI to generate or assess anything, does not track a worker’s location, and does not give safety or legal advice. It carries the permit form, dates and versions each completion against the worker and the job, and stops the roster booking someone whose ticket for the task is not current.

Frequently asked questions

What is a permit to work?

A permit to work is a written authorisation for one high-risk task, in one location, for a set period, stating the hazards, the controls that must be in place before the work starts, the people responsible and the sign-off that closes it. It is issued by an authorised person after checking the job, and it sits between the risk assessment (the JSA or SWMS) and the work itself. Common types are hot work, confined space entry, working at heights, electrical isolation and excavation permits.

When is a permit to work required?

A confined space entry permit is required by the WHS Regulations before a business directs a worker to enter a confined space. Hot work and working at heights permits are not named in the regulations; they are controls a business adopts to meet its duty to manage fire, explosion and fall risks, and most sites, principal contractors and insurers require them as a condition of work. The site’s own permit system decides the triggers, such as a height threshold or any welding near flammables.

What is a hot work permit?

A hot work permit is a written authorisation for welding, grinding, oxy cutting, brazing or any similar process that generates heat or sparks, in a place where something within range could burn. It records the fire hazards found and the controls applied, any isolations and gas tests, the named fire watch and the period they stay after the work stops, and the signatures of the issuer, the person in charge of the work and the fire watch. It closes when the fire watch confirms the area is cold.

Is a confined space entry permit a legal requirement?

Yes. Under the model WHS Regulations, carried in Queensland as regulation 67, a business must not direct a worker to enter a confined space to carry out work unless it has issued a confined space entry permit for that work. The permit must be completed by a competent person, be in writing, and state the space, the names of the people permitted to enter, the period of the work and the risk controls, with space for an acknowledgement that the work is complete and everyone has left. Victoria’s OHS law has its own confined space requirements.

What should a working at heights permit include?

A working at heights permit should record the location and height, the work, the fall control chosen and where it sits in the hierarchy (fall prevention device first, then work positioning system, then fall arrest system), the anchor points and the inspection of harnesses, lanyards or the elevating work platform, the exclusion zone below, the weather and wind limit, the rescue plan, and the names and tickets of the competent persons. Where a fall arrest system is used, the regulations require tested rescue procedures, so the rescue plan is not optional on that permit.

Who can issue a permit to work?

A permit is issued by a person the site’s permit system authorises to do so, usually a supervisor or permit officer who has been trained in that system, is not the person doing the work, and has checked the job in person before signing. For a confined space entry permit the regulations require the permit to be completed by a competent person, meaning someone with the training, qualification or experience to assess the space and its controls. Most sites keep a list of authorised issuers and a register of every permit they issue.