How do I find California contractors whose workers' comp is expiring?

Download CSLB's free lists of contractors by classification, from its public data portal, with workers' compensation information. Then keep the rows whose coverage type is Workers' Compensation Insurance and whose policy expiration date falls in your window.

Step by step

1. Open the Contractors State License Board's public data portal and choose List of Contractors by Classification.
2. Select up to ten classifications, and tick Include Bond and Workers' Compensation Insurance Information. The page marks workers' compensation information as optional, and that box is how you ask for it.
3. Choose Download. The list is an Excel file of the currently renewed licenses in those classifications, giving each license's address, county and classifications, and its workers' compensation coverage type, insurer, policy number and policy dates. Filter the County column to cut it to one county.
4. For class B, general building, use List of Contractors by Classification and County instead. It takes up to ten classifications in up to ten counties and always includes the workers' compensation columns. This site takes class B that way, one county at a time, because the classification page returned an error for a statewide class B list. On this list the policy's dates are headed EffectiveDate, ExpirationDate1 and CancellationDate, and ExpirationDate is the license's own.
5. Keep the rows whose WorkersCompCoverageType is Workers' Compensation Insurance, as this site does. Other types in the lists include Exempt, whose rows have no insurer, policy number or expiration date, and Out of State and Leasing Firm, Temp Agency, etc, whose rows can carry policy dates too.
6. Filter PolicyExpirationDate, or ExpirationDate1 on the county list, to your window, such as today to 90 days out. CSLB writes the dates as text, month first, so turn the column into dates before you filter it.
7. To keep only policies with no cancellation recorded, as this site does, remove the rows with a PolicyCancellationDate, or a CancellationDate on the county list.
8. If you downloaded more than one list, remove repeated license numbers, because a license in several classifications is on the list for each of them.

To check one license's current status, CSLB's list pages point to its Instant License Check. Which licenses need no policy at all is on which CSLB contractors do not have to carry workers' comp.

The master list, and why these steps use the lists

CSLB's master list of contractors offers three statewide files instead, license master, workers' compensation and personnel, each in CSV or Excel. CSLB says the workers' compensation file gives the license number, coverage type, insurer, policy number and policy dates, and that the license master gives the address and workers' compensation information among much else. The files also cover licenses that have expired but can still be renewed, and each is dated under its download link. The steps above use the lists, as this site's own downloads do, because the county page cuts the list to your counties before you download it, while each master list file covers the whole state.

How current the dates are

CSLB charges nothing for the lists: each of its list pages says "There is no charge for this service." Downloading one needs no account.

To have the list sent to you instead, see the weekly file of expiring policies, for one county or all of California. It is a different set from a list you filter yourself. Each Monday's file takes its 90 days from that Monday, from the newest lists this site has downloaded, and it leaves out sole owners, and any license whose business name reads as a person's name unless CSLB lists it as a corporation or a limited liability company.