The only site card of the four that runs out
This site covers four construction site cards and they behave completely differently on expiry. CSCS training in Britain has no expiry on the training itself. An OSHA 10 or 30 card in the United States has no federal expiry at all. An Australian White Card lapses only after two consecutive years out of the industry, which is a disuse rule rather than a deadline.
Ontario is the exception. Working at heights training is valid for three years from the day you passed, and then it is not. That is why the question this page exists to answer, "when does mine run out", has no equivalent anywhere else, and why somebody who has worked in another market has no reason to expect the question at all.
There is no height in the test
Every other market puts a number on it. Australia asks about a risk of falling more than two metres. The United States uses six feet in construction. Britain has no minimum but frames the duty around the fall itself.
Ontario asks something else entirely: is the worker required to use a travel restraint system, a fall restricting system, a fall arrest system, a safety net, a work belt or a safety belt. Six kinds of equipment, and not one mention of how far it is to the ground.
The consequences read backwards until you see the logic.Four metres up on a properly guarded platform, using none of those systems: no training required.Clipped on at a metre and a half: training required.
Which is the right way round, once you see why
Guardrails are a higher order control than a harness. Where the edge is protected, the fall is prevented by the structure, and nobody is relying on equipment being correctly fitted, correctly anchored and correctly used. The moment somebody is wearing fall protection, all three of those become load bearing, and they are exactly what the training covers.
So the rule is not indifferent to height. It is targeting the situation where the outcome depends on a person's understanding of their own equipment, and that situation is defined by the equipment rather than by the drop.
The refresher, and who is allowed to sit it
The refresher is the practical module on its own, and it re-validates you for another three years. It is open only to people who have already completed both modules of an approved program. If you have never done the full course, the short one is not available to you: your next course is the whole thing.
And the timing has a trap in it. The refresher re-validates from the day you sit it, not from your current expiry, so going early does not roll over. Sitting it six months out throws away six months you had already paid for. Equally, leaving it to the last two weeks assumes a provider has a practical session free when you need one, which is not a safe assumption.
Ontario stacks its training and this is one layer
Awareness training under O. Reg. 297/13 applies to every worker in the province and separately to every supervisor. It does not expire. Working at heights is an additional requirement, for construction work using fall protection, and it is the one with the clock on it.
Neither satisfies the other. A worker with current working at heights training who never did the awareness module is short of a requirement, and so is a worker with awareness training who is clipping on to a lifeline.
It is not the training and it does not replace it
It works out dates and whether the requirement is triggered. It is not the training and it is not a substitute for it: the program is delivered by approved providers, the practical module has to be done in person, and there is no route to a valid card that runs through a website. Nor does it cover the rest of Canada, because this is Ontario law and every province runs its own occupational health and safety regime.
Common questions
How long is working at heights training valid in Ontario?
Three years from the day you successfully completed an approved program. It is the only construction site card of the four this site covers that expires on a date at all: CSCS training has no expiry, an OSHA 10 or 30 card has no federal expiry, and an Australian White Card lapses only after two consecutive years out of the industry, which is disuse rather than a deadline. Ontario runs a clock.
Who needs working at heights training?
Workers on a construction project who are required to use fall protection. The regulation names six kinds: a travel restraint system, a fall restricting system, a fall arrest system, a safety net, a work belt or a safety belt. Both limbs have to be true, so a construction project alone is not enough and neither is using a harness away from one.
How high do I have to be working before I need it?
There is no height in the test, and that is the part that catches people who learned the rule somewhere else. Australia asks about a risk of falling more than 2 metres and the United States uses six feet in construction. Ontario asks only whether the work requires fall protection. Somebody four metres up on a properly guarded platform, using none of the six systems, is outside the requirement. Somebody clipped on at a metre and a half is inside it.
Why does the rule work that way round?
Because guardrails are a higher order control than a harness. If the edge is protected, the fall is prevented by the structure and nobody is relying on equipment or on their own technique. If somebody is wearing fall protection, the plan depends on that equipment being fitted, anchored and used properly, and that is the situation the training exists for. Read that way the rule stops being counter-intuitive.
What is in the refresher, and can I just do that?
The refresher is the Working at Heights Practical module, and it re-validates you for a further three years. You can only sit it if you have already completed BOTH modules of an approved program, theory and practical. Somebody who has never done the full program cannot start with the short one, so for them the next course is the whole thing rather than half a day.
Should I do the refresher early?
Not much before you need to. The refresher re-validates for three years from the day you sit it, not from your current expiry date, so going six months early costs you six months of validity you had already paid for. That said, do not leave it to the last fortnight either: providers fill up and the practical module is not something you can do online in an afternoon.
Is this the same as the awareness training?
No, and Ontario stacks them. Occupational health and safety awareness training under O. Reg. 297/13 applies to every worker and separately to every supervisor, and it does not expire. Working at heights is an additional requirement for construction workers using fall protection, and it is the one with the clock on it. Passing one does not satisfy the other in either direction.
Is anyone exempt?
Workers directly employed by an automobile manufacturer or assembler. It is a genuinely narrow carve-out and it is worth knowing it exists mainly because it is the kind of thing somebody half-remembers and then applies to a job it does not cover.