QBCC licence search

Search the contractor's name, ABN or licence number above. You will see the licence number, each licence class and whether it is current. Then confirm it on the QBCC licensee register before you sign or pay a deposit, because licences change daily.

In Queensland, most building work valued over $3,300, including labour and materials, must be carried out by a contractor holding a QBCC licence of the right class. Some work needs a licence at any value, including plumbing and drainage, fire protection, building design and site classification. Electrical work is licensed by the Electrical Safety Office, not the QBCC.

A company licence belongs to the company, which is the business that signs your contract and sends your invoice. An individual licence belongs to a person. A director's individual licence does not license their company, so check the licence is held by the business named on the contract.

A licensed company must have a nominee supervisor, a person whose own licence supervises the company's work. A nominee supervisor licence does not let that person contract for work in their own name, and it is not the company's licence.

Each class names the work the licence covers, for example Carpentry, Plumbing and Drainage or Builder - Low Rise. A licence in one class does not cover work in another, so check the class matches the work in your contract.

3,435 construction companies went into external administration last financial year: nine a day, and one in four company failures in Australia. Most had records lodged months earlier, such as a creditor's winding-up application, a contested statutory demand or an adjudication decided against them. Those records sit with ASIC, the courts and the licensing authorities, not with the business you are about to sign.

Insolvency and court records, Security of Payment adjudication decisions, licence standing and conduct records from the state registers, and the TradesField Rating. Every report lists the registers checked and the date each was last checked, so a gap is never read as a clean record.

A grade from A to E, with a score out of 100, that shows a company's standing in the Australian construction industry. It is built from official filings, court records, licence history and adjudicated payment disputes, and every company is scored the same way. No business is graded by hand and nobody can pay for a better grade.

No. A credit bureau reads whether a company pays its bills. The Construction Background Report reads the registers construction's own authorities keep, which is why an adjudicated payment dispute counts and a late invoice does not. It does not assess workmanship.