The guy in the hard hat asked, "Can you jump down for the minute?" He looked like a person of authority so I obliged. I hit the ground from 2nd deck of the scaffold from where we were performing our network cabling installation in about 5 seconds. The "man" said," Can I see your four hour scaffold user card?" "Huh?" I said puzzled. The OSHA inspector repeated, " Can I see your four hour scaffold user card?" To his dismay I did not have one to display. He took some notes and we were banned from mounting the scaffold until we had certified employees on board.

The subsequent day we obtained a hefty penalty from the NYC Dept Of Buildings. We scrambled to organize a four Hour Supported Scaffold Person class on the jobsite. The class happened 3 days afterwards and five techs were now certified. This was back in 2009. I'm not sure when the rule was put into effect. The cards are good for four years, which then they'll need to be renewed. By then, who knows the rules may be completely different. Possibly we'll will need ten or twelve hours! Check to law in your local area so you don't get hit with a heavy fine like we did.

Are You Not OSHA Authorized? You are not permitted on a scaffold in NYC with out a 4 Hour Supported Scaffold User Card, yes even if you are doing the Network Cable Installation in Kent. In addition you can not erect a scaffold more than 40' tall without having a 32 hour training session on erecting/dismantling scaffold. Safety is number one in today's building arena and for good reason. Would you work on a 50' tall scaffold after a person built it that had no clue on how to assemble it properly? No Thanks!

Even if you are not enthusiastic about it, get your personnel trained. It is for their own safety piece of mind for you and your team. You can check your local city website for a list of approve scaffold training companies.

I am an advocate of Safety on all construction sites, small or large, no doubt. I heard eventually there will be a class on how to operate a ladder! If you cannot operate a ladder you should probably be baking cookies or sitting behind a desk(respect both jobs) but definitely not roaming a construction site.

I would love to hear from network cabling installation professional or building professionals from across the US to see what the laws are inside the other states.