A method for controlling a sleep mode in a wireless access communication system is disclosed. In the method, a base station and a subscriber terminal share a predetermined number of SI for a sleep mode control, and the base station sets a paging position by means of a predetermined BCID assigned to subscriber terminals and the SI, so that the base station can easily manage sleep intervals of the subscriber terminals. Further, since information for a sleep interval scheduling is not transmitted when the subscriber terminal shifts to a sleep mode, the amount of traffic between the subscriber terminal and the base station can be reduced.