Getting an insurance license in Washington

Casualty

Sells cover against legal liability in Washington, including liability for death, injury or disability and for damage to real or personal property. The pre-licensing education was dropped on 2023-07-23.

Crop Adjuster

Adjusts crop losses, and it is the one Washington license with a pre-licensing education requirement in front of it. Which requirement depends on the crops: a private-market-only adjuster sits the state paper, and anybody touching federal crop insurance takes the Crop Adjuster Proficiency Program instead, whose courses and examinations only one organization runs.

Disability

Washington's name for the health line, and the Office spells the equivalence out on its own licensing page: health, disability and accident and sickness all mean this one. Idaho and Montana use the same name. The pre-licensing education was dropped on 2023-07-23.

Emergency Adjuster

Not a license but a registration, and Washington asks for it in the one situation where it asks for nothing else. A nonresident independent adjuster working a single loss, or the losses from a catastrophe the governor has proclaimed, needs no Washington license provided the registration is filed. It runs 180 days from the proclamation, not from the day it was filed.

Health Care Benefit Manager

Washington's answer to the pharmacy benefit manager license, and it is wider than the name most states use: one registration covers pharmacy, radiology, laboratory and mental health benefit management alike, and the test is whether the service affects patient access to care. $500 to register and $750 to renew since 2026-01-24.

Independent Adjuster

Investigates and negotiates settlement of insurance claims on behalf of insurers only, or applies the facts of a claim to the policy, under a license Washington issues to an individual or to a business entity. There is no pre-licensing course anywhere in it: the qualification is a year of salaried claims work, one of three designations, or a supervised trainee program, and the first of those three also removes the examination.

Life Settlement Broker

Represents the owner of a life policy being sold, and owes that owner a fiduciary duty. A year with the life line of authority behind you is the whole qualification, and there is no examination and no course. The Office issues it as a license with its own fees; the Act calls it a notification laid on a producer license.

Life Settlement Provider

The buying side of a life settlement, licensed by the Company Supervision Division rather than by producer licensing, and the one Washington insurance license that is not on the Office's Get licensed pages at all. A plan of operation, an antifraud plan, evidence of financial responsibility set by rule, and $250 a year.

Life

Sells life insurance in Washington, which the statute writes as coverage on human lives including endowment and annuity benefits, benefits for death or dismemberment by accident, and disability income. The pre-licensing education this line used to require was dropped on 2023-07-23.

Limited Line Credit Insurance

Credit insurance sold alongside an extension of credit in Washington. It is the second of the two limited lines the Office asks an examination for, and no course is required for it.

Personal Lines

Property and casualty insurance sold to individuals and families for primarily noncommercial purposes in Washington. It is one line rather than two, and the pre-licensing education was dropped on 2023-07-23.

Portable Electronics

Cover for communications equipment sold at the point of sale in Washington, licensed as a specialty producer. Washington is the only state here that separates its specialty lines from its limited lines, and this is one of the three. Washington asks no pre-licensing course of it, and no examination either: RCW 48.17.110(2)(a) leaves the examination for these lines to the commissioner's discretion, and the Office's own licensing steps ask one for surety and credit and for nothing else in the group.

Premium Finance Company

Lends the premium and takes the policy as security, under a license the Office renews every 1 May for $100. Doing it unlicensed is a misdemeanor. The oddity is in the paperwork: each authorized individual files a uniform producer application with the words Premium Finance written into the Other column of the limited lines grid.

Property

Sells cover for direct or consequential loss or damage to property of every kind in Washington. The pre-licensing education was dropped on 2023-07-23.

Protection Product Guarantee Provider

Stands behind the guarantee that comes with a protection product, the rustproofing or the paint sealant or the theft deterrent, and Washington registers it separately from the service contract provider it sits beside in the same chapter. $200,000 of net worth, $250 to apply and $250 every 1 July.

Public Adjuster

The mirror of the independent adjuster: the same qualifications and the same paper, exercised on behalf only of insureds, with a $5,000 bond that has to be filed before the license issues and kept in force while it lasts. Washington lets one person hold both licenses at once and forbids using them on the same claim.

Reinsurance Intermediary

One license and two classes: the broker places cessions for a ceding insurer without power to bind, and the manager binds or manages reinsurance business for a reinsurer. The application is a single packet with a box to tick, and the fee is $50 one way and $100 the other.

Rental Car

The cover offered alongside a rental car in Washington, licensed as a specialty line to a rental car agent. Washington asks no pre-licensing course of it, and no examination either: RCW 48.17.110(2)(a) leaves the examination for these lines to the commissioner's discretion, and the Office's own licensing steps ask one for surety and credit and for nothing else in the group.

Self-Service Storage

Cover for the contents of a rented storage unit in Washington, licensed as a specialty line and issued to a business entity rather than to an individual. Washington asks no pre-licensing course of it, and no examination either: RCW 48.17.110(2)(a) leaves the examination for these lines to the commissioner's discretion, and the Office's own licensing steps ask one for surety and credit and for nothing else in the group.

Service Contract Provider

Sells the extended warranty on the vehicle, the appliance or the home heating fuel service, under a registration rather than a license. The whole qualification is money: $200,000 of net worth behind a reimbursement insurance policy or a bond, or $100,000,000 and no insurance at all. Washington registers the provider and expressly does not register the administrator.

Surety

Surety in Washington, filed under limited lines at RCW 48.17.170(1)(g) and examined all the same. Washington is the only state on this site that separates its limited lines from its specialty lines, and this is one of the two limited ones the Office asks an examination for.

Surplus Line Broker

Places business with insurers that are not admitted in Washington, on top of a property and casualty producer license. Two bonds, an office in the state, and a resident examination whose content outline the Office publishes: 25 of its items are on insurance company annual statements and the IRIS ratios.

Title Agent

Issues title insurance policies for an appointed title insurer, and Washington licenses only the business entity: the individuals working under it are exempt from licensing by name. The qualification is property rather than paper, a complete set of tract indexes for every county the agent writes in, plus $200,000 of fidelity cover and a $10,000 surety bond.

Travel

Travel insurance in Washington, and the Office is emphatic about one thing: the travel line has to be listed on the license by name, and holding life, disability, property or casualty does not cover it. It is the one limited line the Office's own steps do not ask an examination for. Washington asks no pre-licensing course of it, and no examination either: RCW 48.17.110(2)(a) leaves the examination for these lines to the commissioner's discretion, and the Office's own licensing steps ask one for surety and credit and for nothing else in the group.

Variable Life and Variable Annuity Products

Sells cover under variable life insurance contracts and variable annuities in Washington, and the statute draws this line wider than anywhere else: it reaches any other life insurance or annuity product that reflects the investment experience of a separate account. There is no variable paper. The line is reached on the life examination plus a securities salesperson license, and the life line of authority has to be held alongside it.