SACRAMENTO, CA – The California Contractors State License Board (CSLB) issued the first state contractor license to a limited liability company (LLC) on January 19, 2012, as part of the new business type that became eligible for licensure following the passage of Senate Bill 392 in 2010. The recipient is from the state of Washington: Doyon Project Services LLC, License No. 969358.

“To date, CSLB has received 36 LLC applications,” said CSLB Registrar Steve Sands. “However, our Licensing division has had to reject many because they were submitted without the correct information. We want to alert applicants to the errors we’re noticing so they can correct them before submitting incomplete application forms and causing a delay in their business operations.”

A common reason for rejection is the missing LLC registration number, which is issued by the California Secretary of State’s office (SOS). That number must be included on page one of the application. Companies should not submit the LLC application to CSLB until the SOS number has been issued.

Another common problem is that the personnel listed on the application do not match those reported by SOS. The same names and number of personnel listed on the application must match all of the personnel information provided to CLSB by SOS.

An issue related to the LLC personnel is that SOS has a four-month processing backlog for the Statement of Information (Form LLC-12) initial filings and updates, which are essential for reporting the LLC’s personnel (members and managers). CSLB cannot process the LLC license application until all information is consistent with SOS records. The personnel information is necessary for CSLB to determine the appropriate amount of required LLC liability insurance (between $1 million and $5 million, depending on the number of personnel).

Businesses that are planning to submit an LLC application to CSLB should plan for the four-month processing delay before submitting their application if they have recently submitted an initial or updated Statement of Information to SOS. However, SOS does offer expedited processing for an additional fee ($350 for 24-hour processing, and $750 for same-day processing—in by 9:30 a.m., out by 4:00 p.m.) http://www.sos.ca.gov/business/be/preclearance-expedited-services.htm.