Free Scope of Work Template
A scope of work is the part of a contract that says what you are actually doing. Most construction disputes are not about price, they are about whether something was included, which means they are really about this document.
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What belongs on a scope of work
- The contract this scope attaches to, identified by date
- Every task you are doing, written in the order it will happen
- Everything you are not doing, written with the same effort as what you are
- Who supplies which materials, and when client supplied items must arrive
- What access, power, water and clearing you need from the client
- Which permits you pull and which the client handles
- How discovered conditions are handled, before one is discovered
- Milestones, which is also the payment schedule
A finished scope of work, filled in
A bathroom tile job, written as the exhibit it is meant to be rather than as a contract of its own. The interesting part of a scope is not the format, it is how much of the argument you can win in advance by writing the lines properly, so that is what the notes are about.
- The field that turns this into an exhibitATTACHED TO CONTRACT DATED carries 9 October, and the scope has its own number, SOW-114. Those two fields are what let the contract say "the work is as described in scope SOW-114 dated 12 October" and mean something exact. A scope with no number and no parent contract is a piece of paper that both sides remember differently.
- Every line opens on a verbDemolish, install, apply, set, grout, clean. A scope written in nouns, "bathroom tile, waterproofing, backer board", is a list of topics and it commits nobody to anything. A scope written in verbs is a list of things you have promised to do, and it is just as clear about the things you have not.
- Quantities, not adjectives48 square feet of floor and 90 square feet of wall, 12x24 on the floor and 3x12 in the surround, one niche and one soap ledge. "Tile the bathroom" covers a second niche and forty more square feet for free. A number in the line is what makes a change order a change rather than an argument about what was always included.
- The waterproofing line has a test in it, not a promiseTwo coats, and a flood test held 24 hours before any tile is set. Waterproofing is the single most disputed item on a bathroom job because nobody can see it once the tile is on. A line that names the test names something that either happened or did not, which is the only kind of promise worth writing down.
- Client supplied is said twice on purposeIt appears inside the tile lines and again in the exclusions paragraph. That is not sloppy duplication. Material supply is the most common misunderstanding on a tile job, and a client reading only the scope lines and a client reading only the exclusions should both come away with the same answer.
- Two kinds of exclusion, doing two different jobsThe paragraph under the work names the things that will actually come up here: plumbing, electrical, rotten joists, painting, the tub. Clause 3 further down is the generic catch all that says anything not written is excluded. The generic clause alone loses the argument, because the client never imagined the specific thing and will say so.
- Dates on the scope, not only on the contractStart 2 November, completion 20 November. A scope carrying its own dates survives being detached from the contract and handed to a sub, a supplier or an inspector, and that is exactly what happens to scopes.
- The pricing basis has to agree with the exclusions$4,180.00, fixed price, labor only. The exclusions say the client supplies the tile, so the price cannot quietly be a fixed price for the finished bathroom. These two fields contradicting each other is the most expensive mistake on this sheet, and it is also the easiest one to check: read the pricing basis, then read the exclusions, and see whether they are describing the same deal.
- Page 1 of 2, and page two is the standing clausesClauses 4 to 9 cover who supplies what, site access, permits, discovered conditions, milestones and clean up, and then the signatures. They are the same on every job, they are printed in full further down this page, and they are the reason page one can stay this specific.
A scope of work is normally attached to a contract rather than signed on its own, and this one names the contract it belongs to in its own header. Attach it, reference it by date, and keep the copy you attached: a scope that was revised twice and never re-attached is the version nobody agreed to.
The exclusions list is the valuable half
Contractors write four paragraphs of inclusions and one line of exclusions, then lose the argument about disposal, permits and the rot behind the shower.
Write the exclusions with the same care. A client reading "permits are not included, the fee is normally $300 to $700 in this county" is a client who cannot be surprised by it later.
Say what happens when you find something
You will open a wall and find something. The question is whether the document already says what happens next, or whether you will be negotiating it standing in dust with the client watching.
A discovered conditions clause turns a fight into a process: stop, price it, change order, continue.
Sequence is scope
A scope that lists twelve tasks with no order invites the client to ask why the tiler has not started. Listing the sequence sets the expectation and doubles as the progress payment schedule.
It also exposes the dependencies you are relying on other people for, which is the honest time to raise them.
Questions people ask
Is a scope of work the same as a contract?
No. The scope describes the work. The contract sets price, payment, warranty, termination and dispute terms. The scope is usually attached to the contract as an exhibit, and the contract on this site refers to it that way.
How detailed should a scope of work be?
Detailed enough that somebody who was not at the sales meeting could walk the job and tell whether it is finished. That is the working test.
Should a scope of work include prices?
It can, but it does not have to. Many contractors keep pricing in the contract and the estimate and keep the scope purely descriptive, so it can be shared with subs without showing numbers.
Is this template free?
Yes. Download the blank PDF or Word file, or fill one in on this page. No signup, no email, no watermark.