Just got an OSHA HazCom citation?
Contest in writing within 15 working days of receiving it (29 CFR 1903.17(a)). Post it right away (1903.16). Fix each item by its abatement date and certify the fix within 10 calendar days after that date (1903.19(c)). If a fix can't be finished in time, the petition for more time is due by the close of the next working day after the abatement date (1903.14a(c)).
This page is general guidance, not legal advice. The dates that bind you are the ones on your own citation and notice of proposed penalty. Work from those, and call your OSHA Area Office if anything is unclear. Deadlines on this page were checked against 29 CFR Part 1903 and 29 U.S.C. 659 on September 28, 2026.
Step-by-step citation response
Five steps from the day the citation lands to closing it out with OSHA.
Step 1: Post the citation the day it arrives
Post each citation, unedited, at or near the place of each violation. If your crews are spread across jobsites, post it where employees report each day. It stays up until the violation is abated or for 3 working days, whichever is later, and filing a contest doesn't change that (29 CFR 1903.16). For a serious, repeat or willful item on equipment that moves between sites, tag the equipment or attach a copy of the citation to its controls (1903.19(i)). Write down the date the papers arrived: the contest window counts from that day.
Step 2: Calendar the 15 working days
Send the Area Director a written notice of intention to contest, postmarked within 15 working days of the day you received the notice of proposed penalty (29 CFR 1903.17(a)). Say whether you contest the citation, the proposed penalty, or both. Miss the window and the citation and penalty become a final order of the Review Commission that no court or agency can review (29 U.S.C. 659(a)). An informal conference does not stop this clock (29 CFR 1903.20), so count from the day your own papers arrived.
Step 3: Decide: accept, confer, or contest
You can accept the items and fix them, ask the Area Office for an informal conference, file a notice of contest, or combine them. The conference is where penalty reductions, item wording and abatement dates get settled, and a date set in an informal settlement agreement becomes your abatement date (29 CFR 1903.19(b)(2)(i)(C)). The contest deadline keeps running while you talk.
Step 4: Fix each cited HazCom item
For HazCom that usually means the written program (29 CFR 1910.1200(e)(1)), labels on workplace containers (1910.1200(f)(6)), SDSs readily accessible during each work shift (29 CFR 1910.1200(g)(8)), a current list of hazardous chemicals, and employee training (1910.1200(h)). Photograph and date every correction. Those files are your proof.
Step 5: Certify within 10 calendar days
Within 10 calendar days after each abatement date, send the Area Director a certification for each item: the date and method of the fix, and a statement that affected employees and their representatives were told (29 CFR 1903.19(c)). Willful and repeat items, and serious items the citation flags, also need proof such as receipts or photos (1903.19(d)). Post a copy of what you send near the violation for 3 working days (1903.19(g)). A mailed certification counts on its postmark date (1903.19(h)(2)).
Can't make the abatement date? File a PMA
A petition for modification of abatement date (PMA) asks OSHA for more time on an item you are already fixing. It is open to an employer that has made a good-faith effort to comply but can't finish because of factors beyond its reasonable control (29 CFR 1903.14a(a); OSH Act section 10(c), 29 U.S.C. 659(c)). A guardrail system on backorder, or a specialty contractor who can't mobilize before the date, is the kind of delay the rule describes.
The deadline
File it with the Area Director who issued the citation no later than the close of the next working day after the original abatement date (29 CFR 1903.14a(c)). A petition filed after that has to include a statement of the exceptional circumstances that caused the delay.
What the petition must contain
It has to be in writing, and 29 CFR 1903.14a(b) lists five things it must include.
- 1.Every step you took toward compliance during the abatement period, with the date of each one. (1903.14a(b)(1))
- 2.The specific additional time you need. (1903.14a(b)(2))
- 3.Why you need it: professional or technical people you can't get, materials or equipment you can't get, or construction or alteration of facilities that can't be finished by the original date. (1903.14a(b)(3))
- 4.The interim steps protecting employees from the cited hazard until the fix is done. (1903.14a(b)(4))
- 5.A certification that a copy was posted, and served on the employees' authorized representative if they have one, with the date of posting and service. (1903.14a(b)(5))
After you file
| When | What happens | Rule |
|---|---|---|
| The day you file | Post a copy where affected employees will see it, or near the violation, and leave it up for 10 working days. Serve a copy on their authorized representative if there is one. | 1903.14a(c)(1) |
| Within 10 working days | Affected employees or their representative can object in writing to the Area Director. Once 10 working days pass from posting or service, the right to object is gone. | 1903.14a(c)(2) |
| After 15 working days | OSHA cannot approve the petition before 15 working days from posting or service. An approved petition that nobody contests becomes a final order. | 1903.14a(c)(3), (c)(4) |
| If anyone objects | When OSHA or employees object, the petition, the citation and the objections go to the Review Commission within 3 working days after that 15-day period. | 1903.14a(d) |
| At the Review Commission | The Commission's own rule allows 10 working days for that transfer, where OSHA's says three. It dockets the petition as an expedited proceeding, and you carry the burden of proving a good faith effort and factors beyond your reasonable control. | 2200.37(d)(1)-(3); 659(c) |
What an approved petition changes
The date OSHA approves becomes your abatement date (29 CFR 1903.19(b)(2)(i)(B)), and the 10-day certification clock runs from that new date.
When you don't need a PMA
Inside the 15-working-day contest window, a new date can come out of the informal conference: a date set in an informal settlement agreement becomes the abatement date (1903.19(b)(2)(i)(C)). And for an item you contest in good faith, the abatement period doesn't start until the Review Commission's final order (29 U.S.C. 659(b); 1903.19(b)(2)(ii)).
Letting the date pass without a petition is the expensive option: up to $16,550 per day in failure-to-abate penalties (29 CFR 1903.15(d)(5)). The free Abatement Kit below includes a PMA template laid out in the order of 1903.14a(b).
Download the free Abatement Kit
An abatement checklist, a chemical inventory sheet, and three letter templates: abatement certification (29 CFR 1903.19), petition for modification of abatement date (1903.14a) and notice of intention to contest (1903.17).
Free OSHA HazCom Abatement Kit
A PDF with an abatement checklist, a chemical inventory sheet, and three letter templates: abatement certification, petition for modification of abatement date, and notice of intention to contest. No account, no email.
Templates only, not legal advice. Talk to counsel about your own citation.
$16,550
per serious violation
2026 maximum (unchanged from 2025)
$165,514
per willful or repeat violation
2026 maximum (unchanged from 2025)
$16,550
per day, failure to abate
past the abatement date, up to 30 days
How OSHA classifies a violation
The class OSHA assigns drives the dollars. The maximums are fixed by 29 CFR 1903.15(d), and so is the willful floor. The serious and repeat floors are OSHA policy, published in its annual penalty adjustment memo. Each class links to its full definition.
| Violation class | 2026 penalty | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| Other-than-serious | $0 – $16,550 | A condition related to safety or health but unlikely to cause death or serious harm. |
| Serious | $1,085 – $16,550 | Substantial probability of death or serious harm the employer knew or should have known of. |
| Failure to post | $0 – $16,550 | Not posting the citation, the OSHA poster, or the 300A summary as required. |
| Repeat | $4,256 – $165,514 | A substantially similar violation to one cited within the last five years. |
| Willful | $11,823 – $165,514 | Intentional disregard of, or plain indifference to, the law. |
| Failure to abate | Up to $16,550/day | Each day a cited hazard stays uncorrected past the abatement date, capped at 30 times the daily amount. |
OSHA can reduce a gravity-based penalty for size (up to 70% for 25 or fewer employees), good faith (up to 25%) and a clean history (20%) under CPL 02-00-164 Ch.6 (rev. July 14, 2025). The informal conference is where you make that case.
Go deeper
Fix what got cited
Primary sources
The procedure on this page comes from 29 CFR Part 1903 and section 10 of the OSH Act. Read on September 28, 2026:
- ·29 CFR 1903.16: Posting of citations
- ·29 CFR 1903.17: Notice of contest (15 working days)
- ·29 CFR 1903.14a: Petitions for modification of abatement date
- ·29 CFR 2200.37: Petitions for modification of the abatement period (Review Commission)
- ·29 CFR 1903.19: Abatement verification and certification
- ·29 CFR 1903.20: Informal conferences
- ·29 CFR 1903.15: Proposed penalties
- ·29 U.S.C. 659: OSH Act section 10, enforcement procedures
Penalty amounts are the 2026 federal maximums. State-plan states set their own procedures and amounts. Not legal advice: the binding dates are on your citation.
OSHA Citation Response FAQ
Write down the date the citation and notice of proposed penalty arrived, because the 15-working-day contest window counts from that day. Post the citation, unedited, at or near each violation until it is abated or for 3 working days, whichever is later (29 CFR 1903.16). Then read each item and calendar two kinds of dates: the contest deadline and each abatement date.
Send the Area Director a written notice of intention to contest, postmarked within 15 working days of the day you received the notice of proposed penalty (29 CFR 1903.17(a)). Say whether you contest the citation, the proposed penalty, or both. Miss the window and the citation and penalty become a final order of the Review Commission that no court or agency can review (29 U.S.C. 659(a)). An informal conference does not stop this clock (29 CFR 1903.20), so count from the day your own papers arrived.
A meeting with the OSHA Area Office, requested by the employer or by employees, to discuss the inspection, the citation, the proposed penalty or a notice of contest (29 CFR 1903.20). Employees or their representative may be invited to take part, and anyone can bring counsel. It does not pause the 15-working-day contest window. Once that window closes without a contest, the citation and penalty are a final order (29 U.S.C. 659(a)), so any settlement has to be signed before then.
Within 10 calendar days after the abatement date, for each cited item: the date and method of the fix, and a statement that affected employees and their representatives were informed (29 CFR 1903.19(c)). You skip it only for an item the compliance officer saw corrected within 24 hours during the inspection and noted on the citation (1903.19(c)(2)).
Yes, with a petition for modification of abatement date (PMA) to the Area Director who issued the citation. It has to show a good-faith effort to comply, the specific extra time you need, the reason (people, materials or equipment you can't get, or construction that can't be finished by the date), and how employees are protected in the meantime (29 CFR 1903.14a(a) and (b)).
File it with the Area Director who issued the citation no later than the close of the next working day after the original abatement date (29 CFR 1903.14a(c)). A petition filed after that has to include a statement of the exceptional circumstances that caused the delay.
OSHA can propose a failure-to-abate penalty of up to $16,550 for each day past the abatement date (29 CFR 1903.15(d)(5)), capped at 30 times the daily amount under OSHA's Field Operations Manual. If you see the date slipping, file a PMA no later than the close of the next working day after it.
Serious violations are up to $16,550 each and willful or repeated violations up to $165,514 each (29 CFR 1903.15(d); 2026 amounts, unchanged from 2025). The maximums apply per violation, not per exposed employee. Use the free OSHA Fine Calculator to estimate your exposure and how size, good-faith and history reductions can apply.
A serious violation means a substantial probability of death or serious physical harm that the employer knew or should have known about, up to $16,550 in 2026. A willful violation is committed with intentional disregard of, or plain indifference to, the law. A repeat violation is substantially similar to one cited in the last five years. Willful and repeat both reach $165,514.
Often, yes. Under CPL 02-00-164 Ch.6 (rev. July 14, 2025), OSHA reduces the gravity-based penalty for size (up to 70% for 25 or fewer employees), good faith (up to 25% for an effective safety program) and history (20% for a clean five-year record). Repeat items get the size reduction only, and willful items get no good-faith reduction. The informal conference is where you bring that evidence.
Get the Binder in Order Before the Inspector Arrives. Are You Ready?
OSHA does not give advance notice of inspections (29 CFR 1903.6). Get the binder in order before the opening conference, not during it.
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