General vs. Specialty Contractor Rules in North Dakota

The classes are about money, not trade

N.D.C.C. 43-07-07(1) creates four licence classes and limits each one by the value of a single contract project. Class A carries "no limitation as to the value of any single contract project." Class B may not take a project "of a value in excess of five hundred thousand dollars," class C "three hundred thousand dollars," class D "one hundred thousand dollars." Nothing in that subsection mentions a trade, a scope of work, or a category of building.

The single definition of contractor in N.D.C.C. 43-07-01(1) reinforces the point. It reaches construction, repair, alteration, dismantling and demolition across bridges, highways, roads, streets, buildings, airports, dams, ditches, sewers, water and gas mains, filters, tanks, towers, pipelines "and every other type of structure, project, development, or improvement," and expressly includes subcontractors, public contractors and nonresident contractors in the same definition. A framer, a roofer and a highway contractor are the same kind of licensee under this chapter.

So the North Dakota version of the general-versus-specialty question is a sizing question. Buy the class that fits the largest single project you intend to sign, and remember that N.D.C.C. 43-07-10(3) lets you move up at renewal on payment of the higher initial fee for the class applied for.

Official sources: N.D.C.C. Chapter 43-07 (Contractors), published by the North Dakota Legislative Branch

Electrical and plumbing are licensed separately, by their own boards

A contractor licence under chapter 43-07 is about the value of your contracts, not about your trade. The trades are licensed under their own chapters, and one of the grounds for discipline in N.D.C.C. 43-07-14(1)(e) is "Engaging in work without any trade or professional license as required for the work pursuant to local, state, or federal law." The contractor licence does not cover the trade licence, and holding one while lacking the other is itself a complaint ground.

Electrical work sits under N.D.C.C. chapter 43-09. Section 43-09-09(1) provides that "A person may not undertake or plan to undertake with another person to plan, lay out, supervise, install, make additions, make alterations, or make repairs, in the installation of wiring, apparatus, or equipment for electric light, heat, or power or for a power limited system, unless licensed by the board." Section 43-09-10 names the classes: master electrician, journeyman electrician, class B electrician and power limited electrician. Section 43-09-11 sets the ladder, including eight thousand hours for a journeyman "which experience may not be obtained in less than three years," one year as a licensed journeyman before master, and eighteen months in farmstead or residential wiring for class B.

Chapter 43-09 also carries a rule that catches contractors who intend to sub the work out. Section 43-09-09.2(1) provides that where a licence is required, "a person may not advertise to contract for electrical services without being licensed as or being associated with a class B electrician, master electrician, or power limited electrician, unless that person intends to contract the electrical services with a licensed electrical contractor." Section 43-09-16 lists who is outside the chapter entirely, including utility employees up to the first point of service attachment, telecommunications and cable staff, appliance dealers connecting appliances to an existing receptacle, and an individual installing a nonelectrical system.

Plumbing sits under N.D.C.C. chapter 43-18, and its trigger is geographic. Section 43-18-11 provides that no person, firm, corporation or limited liability company "shall engage in the business of a master plumber, journeyman plumber, or plumber’s apprentice in any location of this state having a public system of waterworks or sewerage unless registered and licensed to do so by the board." Section 43-18-10 requires a firm installing plumbing in such a location to have a licensed master plumber in charge at all times, and adds that "In cities of less than one thousand population and in all rural areas, a licensed journeyman plumber may engage in the business of installing plumbing." Section 43-18-09 gives the state plumbing code "the force and effect of law."

We publish no electrical or plumbing board fee for North Dakota. N.D.C.C. 43-09-13 and 43-18-13 leave the amounts to the boards, and those boards publish their schedules on hosts that are not official government sites, so we do not carry the figures. Get them from the board itself.

Official sources: N.D.C.C. Chapter 43-09 (Electricians), published by the North Dakota Legislative Branch; N.D.C.C. Chapter 43-18 (Plumbing), published by the North Dakota Legislative Branch; N.D.C.C. Chapter 43-07 (Contractors), published by the North Dakota Legislative Branch

What happens when the class does not fit the job

On private work the constraint is the statute itself. N.D.C.C. 43-07-07(1) states what each class holder "is not entitled to engage in," so a class C holder signing a $400,000 contract is outside the licence for that project, which puts them inside N.D.C.C. 43-07-02 territory: a class A misdemeanor, a civil penalty of up to three times the licence fee that must be paid before a licence issues, and the bar on maintaining any claim, action, suit or proceeding in a North Dakota court related to their business as a contractor.

On public work the constraint is procedural and it bites earlier. N.D.C.C. 43-07-12(1) bars award "to any contractor unless the contractor is the holder of a license in the class within which the value of the project falls," requires the licence to have been held at least ten days before bid day for the contractor to be a qualified bidder, and requires the licence copy inside the bid bond envelope, failing which the bid "may not be read or considered and must be returned to the bidder."

The upgrade path is not an emergency procedure. N.D.C.C. 43-07-10(3) contemplates a class change at renewal, on payment of the fee required for issuance of the new class, so a contractor expecting to move from class C to class B should plan it into the February before the March first deadline rather than into the week the bid is due.

Official sources: N.D.C.C. Chapter 43-07 (Contractors), published by the North Dakota Legislative Branch

The obligations that follow you across every class

Whatever class you hold, N.D.C.C. 43-07-04(3) applies: liability insurance, active entity status, trade name and fictitious name registrations, and LLP or limited partnership registrations all have to stay current or the licence goes to not in good standing, and subsection (4) then requires you to "cease soliciting or entering new contract projects."

Whatever class you hold, the renewal report in N.D.C.C. 43-07-10(1) lists every project, contract or subcontract you completed in North Dakota in the preceding calendar year over fifty thousand dollars, and the registrar forwards that list to the state tax commissioner. Class D contractors are not exempt from the reporting; they are simply less likely to have anything over the threshold to report.

And whatever class you hold, N.D.C.C. 43-07-14(1) exposes you to a verified complaint on grounds including abandonment after a deposit, diversion of funds received for a specific contract, fraudulent or deceptive practices injuring one or more persons "in a total amount exceeding three thousand dollars," false statements in an application, engaging in work without a required trade or professional licence, and failing to refund an advance payment once a presumption of abandonment has arisen and a refund has been requested. N.D.C.C. 43-07-15 lets the registrar suspend for up to sixty months, order a civil penalty of not more than one thousand dollars and restitution of not more than five thousand dollars, and bars renewal, reinstatement or a new licence until those are paid.

Official sources: N.D.C.C. Chapter 43-07 (Contractors), published by the North Dakota Legislative Branch

How to check a subcontractor properly in North Dakota

Check three things, not one. First, that the licence exists: N.D.C.C. 43-07-13 requires the registrar to keep a complete indexed record of applications, licences, current contractor year certificates, revocations and expirations "open to public inspection during office hours," and the Secretary of State runs a contractor search through FirstStop.

Second, that the class covers the value of the subcontract you are about to sign. On public work N.D.C.C. 43-07-01(4) puts subcontracts over four thousand dollars inside the definition of a public contract in their own right, so your sub is subject to the same class-fitting rule you are.

Third, that the trade licence exists where the work needs one. N.D.C.C. 43-07-14(1)(e) makes "Engaging in work without any trade or professional license as required for the work pursuant to local, state, or federal law" a complaint ground against a contractor, so putting an unlicensed electrician or plumber on your job is your exposure as well as theirs. For electrical, N.D.C.C. 43-09-09(1) is the requirement and 43-09-10 the classes; for plumbing, N.D.C.C. 43-18-11 is the requirement and 43-18-10 the rule that a firm installing plumbing where there is a public water or sewer system must have a licensed master plumber in charge at all times.

Official sources: N.D.C.C. Chapter 43-07 (Contractors), published by the North Dakota Legislative Branch; N.D.C.C. Chapter 43-09 (Electricians), published by the North Dakota Legislative Branch; N.D.C.C. Chapter 43-18 (Plumbing), published by the North Dakota Legislative Branch; North Dakota FirstStop: contractor search

Check the official page yourself before you file or sign

North Dakota is unusually well documented compared with most states in this library: the contractor licence classes, the fees, the thresholds and the penalties are all in the statute itself rather than in an agency fee schedule, and chapter 43-07 can be read end to end in one sitting. That is a good reason to read it rather than to trust a summary, including this one.

Three limits on what you just read. We publish no bond figure, because N.D.C.C. 43-07-11 was repealed in 1995 and no bond requirement survives in the chapter. We publish no electrical or plumbing board fee, because the statutes leave those to the boards and the boards publish on hosts that are not official government sites. And we publish no unemployment insurance date or figure, and no municipal fee, bond, threshold or renewal cycle for any North Dakota city or county, because we could not source the first on an official host and our own rules bar the second while no local jurisdiction has cleared publication review.

Official sources: N.D.C.C. Chapter 43-07 (Contractors), published by the North Dakota Legislative Branch; North Dakota Secretary of State: Contractors licensing