The Daily Weather Go/No-Go SOP

Purpose

This procedure makes every weather-sensitive job on tomorrow's board get a call - go, watch or hold - made by a named person, against the limit the product or equipment actually carries, early enough that the customer and the crew can act on it. Without it, the call gets made in the driveway at 8 a.m. by whoever is standing there, against how the sky looks, and the failures arrive two days later as caulk that never set or stain that streaked. The rule underneath is the one in 'Weather as a Work Condition: The Rule for Every Trade': the data sheet sets the limit, the forecast only says whether the window fits inside it.

Scope

Covers every job tagged weather-sensitive at booking: exterior coatings, stains and sealants, concrete, roofing, ladder and lift work, spraying, refrigerant charging outdoors, and anything with a rain-safe or cure time. Covers the afternoon read the day before, the morning recheck, the call-out deadline and the on-site check.

Does not cover what the customer is told and how (see related: The Weather Reschedule Communication SOP), the shop's wind limits by task (see related: The Wind Hold for Ladders, Roofs and Spraying SOP), protecting work left open overnight (see related: The Overnight Open-Work Protection SOP) or storm preparation (see related: How to Secure a Job Site Days Before a Forecast Storm). How to read the forecast itself belongs to 'Reading a Forecast for the Work, Not the Weekend'.

Roles and responsibilities

The lead tech can always stop on site. Nobody, including the owner, can turn a reading that fails the sheet into a go.

Procedure

1. By 13:30, put the governing limit on every weather-sensitive job for tomorrow. For each tagged job, the dispatcher enters each limit that applies (minimum air temperature, minimum surface temperature, surface margin over dew point, rain-safe hours, maximum wind) with its source: the product's data sheet, the equipment manual, or the shop's own wind table. Acceptance: every tagged job shows at least one limit with a number, a unit and a source. Wrong looks like a blank limit field or "warm enough"; the stop rule is the dispatcher calls the lead tech for that job, who reads the limit off the sheet by 14:00 (see related: How to Read a Product Data Sheet for Its Weather Limits), and a job still without a sourced limit at 14:00 is a hold. Hazard: none at this step, it is desk work.

2. At 14:00, read the hourly forecast for each job across its whole window. The window is the application hours plus the cure or rain-safe period the sheet gives, which usually runs overnight. For each limit, the dispatcher writes the forecast value at the worst hour in that window: the lowest temperature, the smallest surface-to-dew-point gap, the highest rain probability, the highest gust. Acceptance: a forecast number in every limit cell, taken from the hourly forecast for the job's own location. Wrong looks like the daily high and low copied from a weather app's front page, which hides the 4 a.m. low the cure window crosses; the stop rule is re-read hourly. Hazard: none, desk work.

3. Make the provisional call against the shop's margin. Go: the worst hour clears the limit by the margin (shop defaults, tune to your experience: 5 F for any temperature or dew-point limit, 5 mph under any wind limit). Watch: the worst hour meets the limit but not the margin. Hold: the worst hour fails the limit. For rain against a rain-safe time: go below 20 percent probability in every hour of the rain-safe window, watch at 20 to 39 percent in any hour, hold at 40 percent or more in any hour. Acceptance: each job carries one call and the number that made it. Wrong looks like a job called go on a 2 F margin because the customer has waited a month; the stop rule is the margin is the margin, and pressure goes to the owner at step 8. Hazard: none, desk work.

4. By 16:00, send every hold to the office and give the crew other work. Holds are passed to the office, which tells the customer under its own procedure. The dispatcher moves the crew to backlog work that does not carry the same limit: indoor work, prep, a different elevation, shop tasks. Acceptance: every hold has a customer-contact entry and every crew has a full day. Wrong looks like a held crew with an empty board at 16:00; the stop rule is the dispatcher tells the owner, who decides whether to pull a future indoor job forward. Hazard: none at the desk; a reassigned crew is briefed on any hazard the new job carries before they leave.

5. At 05:30, recheck every go and every watch. The dispatcher refreshes the hourly forecast, looks at radar for anything approaching, and checks current observations at the nearest station. Each new worst-hour value is written beside the afternoon value. A go that now misses the margin becomes a watch; a watch that now fails the limit becomes a hold; a watch that now clears the margin becomes a go. Acceptance: a morning number beside every afternoon number, and every watch resolved to go, hold or "site check" by 06:15. Wrong looks like a recheck that only opened the radar; the stop rule is the numbers get rewritten or the call is not posted. Hazard: none, desk work.

6. By 06:30, post the calls. The call-out deadline is 06:30, or 2 hours before the crew would leave for that job, whichever is earlier. The dispatcher posts the board to the crews, and the office makes any new hold contacts. A watch left unresolved at the deadline goes out as "site check", meaning the crew goes and the lead's readings decide. Acceptance: board posted with a timestamp before the deadline. Wrong looks like a crew already on the road when the hold arrives; the stop rule is the crew finishes the drive, phones in, and is reassigned from there rather than turning around twice. Hazard: a hold or a change sent to a driver is read at the next stop, never on a phone while driving.

7. Before any weather-limited material is opened, the lead tech takes the site readings. On a site check job or any job where the sky disagrees with the forecast, the lead measures what the sheet limits: air temperature, surface temperature with an infrared thermometer at the coldest surface to be worked (shaded, north-facing, metal), relative humidity and dew point with a hygrometer, and wind with a handheld anemometer at working height. Acceptance: every reading meets the sheet's limit, measured where the work will be. Wrong looks like a reading taken in the sun on the south side for work on the north; the stop rule is the lead stops that work, phones the dispatcher, and the crew moves to an elevation, task or job that does pass. Hazard: readings taken from a ladder or roof edge follow the shop's wind limits and the icy-path rules; a frost-covered roof is not walked to take a reading (see related: Snow and Frost on a Roof Before Anyone Climbs It).

8. When dispatcher, lead and customer disagree, the owner decides within 30 minutes. The dispatcher phones the owner with the limit, the reading or forecast value, and each side's position. The owner may make a stricter call than the procedure; the owner may not make a go out of a reading that fails the sheet. Acceptance: the decision and the owner's name on the board within 30 minutes of the call. Wrong looks like a customer standing in the driveway talking the lead into it; the stop rule is the lead says the owner decides and does not open the material until the owner has. Hazard: none, a phone call.

9. At day's end and the next morning, record what the weather actually did. For each job that went, the lead records the readings at the end of application; the dispatcher records the actual overnight low and any rain from the nearest station. Acceptance: actual values beside the forecast values for the whole window. Wrong looks like nothing recorded because the work looked fine; the stop rule is the board is not closed out until the actuals are in. Hazard: none, desk work.

The record this produces

The board carries, for each weather-sensitive job: every limit with its source, the afternoon value at the worst hour, the morning value, the call, the time, and who made it; the lead's site readings with time and location; any owner decision; and the actuals. It lands on each job record. The office reads it when a customer asks why their job moved; the owner reads it when a weather callback comes in, because the record shows whether the call was made against the sheet; the dispatcher reads the forecast-versus-actual columns to learn which forecasts to trust in which season.

A worked pass

Wednesday afternoon, dispatcher DL builds Thursday's board with three weather-sensitive jobs. The sheet values below are as read from each job's own product sheet and the shop's wind table; another product's numbers will differ.

WEATHER BOARD  Thu   afternoon read Wed 14:05  DL
JOB WORK      LIMIT (source)     FCST    CALL  BY
A   deck      50F air+surf thru  52F     WATCH DL
    stain     24h cure (sheet)   rn 20%
              05:35 recheck      48F     HOLD  DL
B   soffit    gust 20 mph        14 mph  GO    DL
    panels    (shop wind table)
              05:35 recheck      13 mph  GO    DL
C   window    40F air+surf, surf 45/36F  GO    DL
    sealant   5F over dp (sheet)
              09:40 site, north  41/38F  STOP  RK
              11:30 site, north  47/37F  GO    RK
POSTED Thu 05:50     DEADLINE 06:30

Job A, deck stain. The application runs 10:00 to 14:00 Thursday, so the 24-hour cure window runs to 14:00 Friday. At step 2 the worst hour was Friday 06:00 at 52 F against a 50 F limit: 52 minus 50 is a 2 F margin, under the 5 F the shop requires, so step 3 made it a watch. Rain peaked at 20 percent at Friday noon, also a watch. At step 5 the Friday 06:00 forecast had dropped to 48 F, which fails the limit outright, so the job became a hold at 05:35, and the office called the customer at 07:30, two and a half hours before the 10:00 arrival, under the reschedule procedure. The crew moved to a backlog interior job.

Job B, soffit panels from a ladder. Peak forecast gust 14 mph against the shop's 20 mph limit for carrying sheet goods up a ladder: 20 minus 14 is a 6 mph margin, a go. The morning recheck read 13 mph, still a go.

Job C, perimeter sealant on windows. At step 2 the coldest application hour, 10:00, read 45 F air with a 36 F dew point, which clears the 40 F minimum by 5 F; a go. At step 7, at 09:40, the lead tech RK read the north wall surface at 41 F with a dew point of 38 F. The surface met the 40 F minimum, but 41 minus 38 is a 3 F gap against the sheet's 5 F requirement, so step 7 failed and took its stop rule: RK phoned DL, and the crew sealed the south and east elevations first, where the surface read 52 F against the same 38 F dew point, a 14 F gap. At 11:30 the north wall read 47 F with a 37 F dew point, a 10 F gap, and it was sealed.

Step 9. The overnight low Thursday into Friday was 47 F at the nearest station. Job A's hold was right: the stain would have spent its cure at 3 F below its minimum. Job C's actuals went on its record with the times each elevation was sealed.

References

• The product data sheet or equipment manual for each job, which sets every limit on the board
• See related: Weather as a Work Condition: The Rule for Every Trade
• See related: Reading a Forecast for the Work, Not the Weekend
• See related: The Weather Reschedule Communication SOP
• See related: What Dew Point Predicts