Sole owner exemption

A sole owner exemption is, in the Contractors State License Board's terms, an Exemption from Workers' Compensation: a form that a licensee with no employees can file with CSLB in most classifications until the law narrows it on 1 January 2028, in place of a certificate of workers' compensation insurance, certifying that it employs no one. While it is on file, CSLB's public data shows the license's workers' compensation coverage type as Exempt. It stops being valid once the licensee employs anyone in a manner that is subject to the workers' compensation laws of California.

The phrase is not CSLB's own. Sole Owner is one of the business entity types CSLB licenses, a license issued to one individual, but the exemption is not limited to it: CSLB's form is signed by an owner, partner, officer, manager, member or director. Nor is it open to every license. CSLB's workers' compensation page at cslb.ca.gov lists who cannot file it, among them any license in the C-39 roofing class.

The file this site sells from these records has its own page: the contractor renewals file.