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Notice of Delay: What Trade Subs Send and When

November 14, 2026
Notice of Delay: What Trade Subs Send and When

A notice of delay is a short written letter to the party named in your subcontract. It says something is delaying your work and that you expect to ask for time, money or both. Send it the day the delay starts, to the person the contract names, with the cause, the work affected and your best estimate of the impact. The dollar figure can follow later. The notice is what keeps the claim alive. If you also run daily reports and crew hours in one system, such as Subascent, you will have the facts ready when the letter has to go out.

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TL;DR

  • A notice of delay is not a claim. It is the first step that preserves your right to one. Many contracts bar time or money relief if the notice is late.
  • The AIA A201-2017 outer limit is 21 calendar days. Your subcontract may be shorter, so read the notice clause before the first delay, not after.
  • Name the cause, the activities hit, the dates, and a time and cost estimate. If you can't price it yet, say when you will, and reserve your rights.
  • Send a fresh notice for each separate delay event. For a delay that keeps running, send updates on a set interval.
  • Change orders do not automatically cover delay costs. Read the language before you sign one.

Table of Contents

What a notice of delay does for a trade sub

The notice does one job: it tells the other side, in time, that a delay is happening so they can fix it or at least cannot claim surprise. One construction consultant puts it plainly: a contractor that fails to notify on time may waive its rights to time or cost relief and get nothing.

That is the risk for an electrical, plumbing, HVAC, masonry or drywall sub. You are at the bottom of the chain. The GC takes delay notices from you and passes its own up to the owner. Your window is often shorter than the GC's, because the GC needs time to send its own notice upstream.

A notice is also not a promise of a number. An ASCE article by Joseph Hellenbrand, P.E. says the notice should explain the issue, when it was discovered, and whether it might affect budget or schedule. It does not have to state how big the impact will be. As the issue develops, you send more notifications.

What counts as a delay worth noticing

Start with the contract. The standard AIA general conditions, A201-2017 section 8.3.1, list the causes that entitle a contractor to more time:

  • Acts or neglect of the Owner or Architect
  • Changes ordered in the work
  • Labor disputes, fire, unusual delivery delays, unavoidable casualties, adverse weather or other causes beyond the contractor's control
  • Delay authorized by the Owner
  • Other causes the Architect decides justify the delay

For a sub, the everyday versions look like this:

  • The GC hasn't released the area. Your masonry crew shows up and the scaffold or the slab isn't ready.
  • Framing isn't finished, so drywall can't start.
  • A submittal or RFI sits unanswered while your long-lead material waits on the answer.
  • Another trade is in your way, or an out-of-sequence pour moves your start.
  • Weather, but only the kind the contract recognizes (more on that below).

When in doubt, send the notice. A notice you didn't need costs a few minutes. A notice you skipped can cost the whole claim.

How soon you have to send it

The short answer: as soon as you know, and never later than the contract says.

Under A201-2017 section 8.3.2.9, requests for an extension of time go in writing no more than 21 calendar days after the first occurrence of the delay. That is the standard-form outer limit. Subcontracts often tighten it, so the number in your own agreement controls. Pull the notice clause for every job at award and put the deadline where your project manager sees it.

Two other timing rules matter:

  • Ongoing delays. The AGC's handout on delay and disruption recommends follow-up notices at a reasonable interval, typically thirty calendar days, for as long as a continuing cause lasts. If your contract sets a different interval, use that one.
  • Government work. Under FAR 52.242-17, as described in the Chambers USA construction guide, a claim for government-caused delay may not be allowed unless it is asserted in writing, in a stated amount, as soon as practicable after the delay ends and no later than final payment. Your sub-tier contract may set earlier dates.

Some owners write much shorter windows. The University of California's facilities manual, for one, requires a change order request within 3 working days of the date a delay begins. TxDOT's design-build change management guide requires a potential change order notice within 10 days of becoming aware of the event, and says relief for the time before that notice is waived. These show how fast public-owner clauses can run, and they flow down to you.

Is a late notice always fatal? Not always. The AGC handout advises that failing to follow notice requirements strictly should not, by itself, waive an equitable adjustment unless the owner can show it was actually prejudiced. Chambers is blunter: contractors who miss the contract's notice procedures may lose an otherwise valid time request. Enforceability also varies by state. Treat the deadline as hard and the AGC position as a fallback for a lawyer to argue, not a plan.

Who gets the notice

Send it to the person or address the subcontract designates, not to whoever you talk to on site. That is often the GC's project executive or contract administrator rather than the superintendent. A sample-letter guide from Long International says written notice should be served on a specific designated party, as soon as you become aware of the impact event and within the contract period.

Send it to the GC, not to the owner, unless your contract says otherwise. Copy your own project manager and your file. Use the delivery method the contract lists, and if it lists none, use one that gives you a dated record, such as email plus a tracked delivery.

What the letter must say

Keep it to one page where you can. A reader at the GC should see the cause, the dates, the affected work and what you want within thirty seconds. The structure below draws on the template from Gaurav Mehrotra at sjcivil.com and the sample notice from Long International.

  1. Date, project name, contract or subcontract number, and the recipient named in the contract.
  2. A one-line purpose: this is formal written notice of a delay under the subcontract.
  3. The contract clause that provides time or cost relief for this kind of event.
  4. What happened, with dates and locations. Name the activities affected.
  5. The effect: days added to your work, and the cost categories involved if you can name them. If the impact is unknown, say when you will provide it.
  6. A reservation of rights to add information and to seek additional time and costs, such as supervision, overtime, disruption, overhead, equipment rentals and lost productivity.
  7. An offer to meet, then who is copied and what is enclosed.

A worked example

Here is the level of detail that helps. Suppose a masonry sub's crew of six is scheduled to start the second-floor CMU walls on a Monday. The slab is not released. This is the kind of letter body that works:

Under Section 12.3 of the subcontract, we give notice that the second-floor slab at gridlines C to F was not released for masonry on Monday. Our crew of six was scheduled to start CMU walls that day. We estimate at least 3 working days of delay to the wall start and are tracking idle labor and equipment. We will provide a cost estimate within 7 days. We reserve the right to supplement this notice and to seek additional time and compensation. Daily reports and photos are enclosed.

That paragraph states the cause, the place, the crew, the days and when the cost will follow. It also does not argue fault, which is what the next letter, the claim, is for.

Vague versus specific

A line like "delay impacted schedule" proves nothing. BuildLog's guidance shows the contrast: a specific line names the delayed activity, the start dates that moved, the crew that stood down, the number of days and the dollar cost of idle labor. Use that standard in your own notice: who, what, which dates, how many people, how much.

Document the delay as it happens

The notice starts the clock on your claim. The records make the claim worth something. The Chambers guide says the contractor generally has to document the events that caused the delay, related communications, the effects, and efforts to mitigate it.

What that means on a trade job:

  • Daily reports written that day. Not at the end of the week. Record who was on site, what was done, what was blocked and why.
  • Photos with dates. An empty work area at 7:30 a.m. says more than a paragraph.
  • Labor hours by crew and cost code. Idle time has to be separable from productive time.
  • Correspondence. RFIs, submittals, schedule updates, emails from the GC about access.
  • Baseline days. Normal production days make the delay days stand out.
  • Mitigation. What you did to reduce the damage: moved the crew to another area, resequenced, ordered material early.

The foreman is where most of this starts, and it is where most of it goes missing. We cover the field side in how foremen document delay events on the job site. For scheduling problems that come before a formal notice, see how to resolve subcontractor scheduling conflicts.

Weather is a special case

Bad weather alone rarely earns time. Under A201-2017 section 8.3.2.4, a weather-based request needs local climatological reports for the period involved and a report of average precipitation, temperature and wind over the past ten years from the nearest station. Foul weather in itself is not a valid reason. Masonry and concrete subs who work through winter should read our piece on winter work cost factors for masonry subs.

Float can cut your extension

Section 8.3.2.11 of the same form says float built into the project schedule may be proportionately deducted from an approved extension. If the schedule gives the job slack, a short delay to your work may earn no days. Know where the float is before you promise days in your letter.

Change order clauses and delay

This is where subs lose money after doing everything right on notice.

Time extensions usually arrive as change orders. Under A201-2017 section 8.3.2.5, for changes that significantly affect the time and process of the whole work, any time extension is set no later than when the change is authorized, and approved extensions are implemented by change order.

A signed change order can close the door. In one case, the District of Columbia Court of Appeals held that five change orders paid a contractor's direct costs but not the indirect costs of 261 additional days of work. The lesson for a sub: when you sign, reserve your right to time and impact costs not covered. Long International's sample change order transmittal letter includes exactly that reservation, including cumulative impact, before final settlement.

Watch for no-damages-for-delay clauses. Some subcontracts say the sole remedy for being delayed is more time. In a New York case reported by Ernstrom & Dreste, a court held that change order requests grounded in delay and disruption were barred under such a clause, even though they were labeled extra work. Enforceability varies by state, so if your contract has this language and the number is large, call your construction attorney before you sign or send anything.

Change order clauses and delay

Don't work ahead of the paperwork on disputed scope. Hellenbrand's ASCE advice is to hold work on a disputed portion until the parties agree how it will be handled and paid. A contractor that does extra work without clear direction and a payment agreement risks never being paid for it. For examples of the records that back a change order, see our eight change order documentation examples.

Mistakes that sink a delay notice

  • Waiting to price it. Notice first, numbers second.
  • One running letter for everything. Send a separate notice for each distinct delay event, and a short update with a reference to the original notice if one condition runs for weeks.
  • Sending it to the wrong person. The contract names the recipient.
  • Vague impact. Dates, crew size, activities, dollars.
  • No records. BuildLog names no contemporaneous records, vague descriptions and no photos as the reasons most sub delay claims fail.
  • Ignoring the contract's own steps. Delay notice may be the first step of the change order, claim and dispute procedure, per Chambers. Skip a step and you can lose the next one.

More on how these fights start is in our guide to common subcontractor contract disputes.

Where a notice usually breaks down in a trade shop

Most late notices are not legal failures. They are office failures. The foreman knows on Tuesday that the area isn't ready. The estimator is on a bid. The project manager hears about it Friday. The notice goes out the following week, and the window is gone.

The fix is a routine, not a template:

  1. At award, the project manager pulls the notice clause and the deadline for each job.
  2. The foreman reports blocked work the same day.
  3. The project manager sends the notice within 24 hours of hearing, even if the facts are thin.
  4. Hours and photos go on file daily, so the cost letter is a summary, not a reconstruction.
  5. Open delay events get a calendar date for the next update.

Promo: keep the field record and the office in one place

Subascent is job and bid management software built for specialty trade subcontractors: electrical, plumbing, HVAC, masonry, concrete, framing, drywall, roofing and more. It includes daily field reporting, labor and crew tracking with a mobile app, change order workflows, and profit analytics. The CrewTrack mobile app for foremen is free as part of the subscription, so the report that starts a delay file comes from the field the day it happens.

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Plans are published as Starter at $49 per month, Scale at $99 per month and Pro at $179 per month, or $490, $990 and $1,790 per year. PDF takeoff is a separate add-on at $99 per month. See the plans and features.

Perspective: the notice is a field problem first

We have run trade businesses, and we have seen the same story more than once. The delay was real. The foreman knew. Nobody wrote it down until the GC asked for backup, and by then the date had passed.

A template does not fix that. A habit does: the foreman reports blocked work the same day, the project manager sends the notice the next morning, and the hours are already sitting in the job file. That is how we built Subascent. Daily reports, crew hours and change orders live next to the job, not in a foreman's truck or an office inbox.

GC-built software is designed around the GC's workflow. A sub's day is different: bids, crews, submittals, change orders and AR, all on small margins. That is why our tools are built for the trades and the way they work.

Send the notice early. Price it later. Keep the paper trail daily.

Dave

FAQ

Is a notice of delay the same as a delay claim?

No. The notice tells the GC a delay has occurred or is coming and that you expect relief. The claim comes later and carries the time and cost proof. A notice, as the Chambers guide describes, may be the first step in the change order, claim and dispute procedure.

Do I have to know the cost before I send it?

No. State the cause, the activities affected and a time estimate if you have one. If you can't price the impact yet, say when you will and reserve your right to add it. The ASCE article says the notice need not state definitively how large the impact will be.

Do I send one notice for a delay that lasts weeks?

Send one notice when it starts, then updates on a set interval. The AGC suggests about thirty calendar days for continuing causes, but your subcontract may set a shorter one. A separate cause gets its own notice.

What if my subcontract says the only remedy is more time?

Then a money claim may be barred, and enforceability varies by state. Read the clause before you sign, raise it with your construction attorney on larger jobs, and make sure your notices still ask for the time you are owed.

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