How to Get a Contractor Licence in Quebec (RBQ)

Quebec does not licence contractors the way Ontario does. There is no set of separate municipal and trade licences to collect one by one. In Quebec, the Régie du bâtiment du Québec (RBQ) issues one company licence, and the people who manage the company prove their competency as guarantors in defined fields. This guide follows the RBQ's own steps for obtaining a licence. Do not carry Ontario licence framing, Ontario exam names, or Ontario fee figures into a Quebec application. Confirm the current fees and exam details with the RBQ, because the opened RBQ pages state the security amounts and the qualification structure but state no fee amounts.

Step 1: Confirm that you need an RBQ licence

In Quebec, anyone who carries out construction work, or has construction work carried out, must hold a licence, unless they are exempted from doing so. To determine whether you require a licence, consult the RBQ guide to determining the type of licence required, and check the RBQ page on work and situations not requiring a licence for the exemptions. The RBQ licence steps page states the distinction plainly: a competency certificate is issued to construction workers and is mandatory for workers carrying out regulated occupations, while the RBQ licence is issued to persons who manage a construction company and concerns the company's right to carry out construction work or have construction work carried out. Holding a competency certificate does not give you an RBQ licence, and holding an RBQ licence does not give your workers their competency certificates.

Two specialist routes sit outside the standard RBQ evaluation. Contractors specializing in electrical work, subclass 16, must contact the Corporation des maîtres électriciens du Québec, which is responsible for evaluating its members' qualifications for obtaining a licence. Contractors specializing in plumbing, heating, oil burners or natural gas burners, subclasses 15.1, 15.2, 15.3, 15.4 and 15.5, must contact the Corporation des maîtres mécaniciens en tuyauterie du Québec, which is responsible for evaluating its members' qualifications. If your work falls in those subclasses, start with the relevant corporation, not with the general RBQ exam route.

Step 2: Set the legal form and register the company

You must specify your company's legal form of organization: natural person, legal person, or partnership. Contact the Registraire des entreprises du Québec to determine which form is best suited to your situation, and note that a lawyer, notary or accountant can also help with that choice. The RBQ also recommends contacting the Commission de la construction du Québec before making the decision, because under certain provisions of Act R-20 a particular legal form may subject the company to certain obligations or restrictions.

Register your company with the Registraire des entreprises du Québec. Doing so will provide you with a Quebec enterprise number. If you are a natural person doing business alone, a sole proprietorship, and exclusively under your own name, you are not required to register with the Registraire des entreprises. If your enterprise is not yet registered, you can avoid filling out the RBQ forms separately by using the Start a Business service in the Zone entreprise, which completes the procedures to create the business with several ministries and government agencies in a single step.

Step 3: Pick the licence subclasses for the work

Your licence must indicate the subclasses corresponding to the work you plan to carry out. The RBQ subclass list includes, for general contractors, subclass 1.1.1 for new residential buildings covered by a guarantee plan, Class I, subclass 1.1.2 for the same work, Class II, subclass 1.2 for small buildings, and subclass 1.3 for all buildings, alongside subclasses for roads and mains, civil engineering structures, and other general work, and a long list of specialized subclasses for work such as concrete structures, masonry, wood structures, and fire alarm systems. Use the RBQ page on determining which licence subclasses you need and the guide to determining the type of licence required to match each type of work you will do to its subclass, and apply for every subclass you need. A licence that omits a subclass does not cover that work.

Step 4: Check the criminal history of officers and lenders

The criminal history of a construction company's officers and lenders is taken into account in the analysis of a licence application, and may result in a refusal. If one of the company's shareholders is a legal person or a partnership, you must provide the RBQ with a list of its officers and declare whether or not the legal person or partnership, or any of its officers, have been convicted in the five years preceding the licence application of an offence under a fiscal law or a criminal act. You must also provide a list of your lenders, with a declaration completed by each lender identifying its officers and indicating whether or not it, or any of its officers, have been convicted in the five years preceding the date of the loan of an offence under a fiscal law or a criminal act. Prepare these declarations early, because a missing or incomplete declaration stalls the application.

Step 5: Arrange the financial guarantee

Contractors must comply with a number of obligations, one of which is to have licence security or to be accredited under the Guarantee Plan for New Residential Buildings. Which one applies depends on the subclasses held: subclass 1.1.1 or 1.1.2 exclusively requires the Guarantee Plan, subclass 1.1.1 or 1.1.2 plus other subclasses requires both licence security and the Guarantee Plan, and subclasses other than 1.1.1 and 1.1.2 require licence security. For general contractors, Schedule I subclasses, the required licence security is $40,000, and for specialized contractors, Schedules II and III subclasses, the amount is $20,000. The RBQ requires this security but does not issue it. Licence security is provided by a number of insurance companies, associations, credit unions and banking institutions, so arrange it through one of those providers and confirm that it uses the form the RBQ accepts.

Contractors who hold a general contractor subclass for new residential buildings, subclasses 1.1.1 and 1.1.2, must be accredited under the mandatory plan and obtain a certificate of accreditation from the authorized plan manager, La Garantie de construction résidentielle (GCR). Unlike licence security, the certificate of accreditation under the Guarantee Plan does not need to be presented with your licence application. After you submit your application, you will receive a notice informing you of the deadline for providing proof of accreditation under the guarantee plan. Do not let that deadline pass while you wait for the licence itself.

Step 6: Qualify through your guarantors

The RBQ must evaluate the professional competency of your construction company in one or more of the following fields of qualification: administration, construction site safety management, project and site management, and the carrying out of construction work. Individuals within your company must act as guarantors and undergo an evaluation of their professional competency. If you are a natural person doing business alone, you will need to undergo all the necessary evaluations. A person may serve as guarantor in one or several fields of qualification, and an individual may also serve as guarantor before the RBQ for more than one company.

The RBQ offers three methods of evaluating professional competency: taking the RBQ examinations, successfully completing a training program recognized by the RBQ, with certificates of successful completion provided along with the licence application, or acquiring sufficient education and professional experience in the fields of qualification and obtaining an equivalence by presenting a professional file. The applicant or guarantor may be exempted from taking the examinations if, in the five years preceding the application, they served as guarantor for a construction company in the field of qualification relevant to the examination, or had their skills evaluated and recognized by the RBQ in the requested field of qualification or in the selected subclass pertaining to the examination. Companies located in Ontario, New Brunswick, or Newfoundland and Labrador, provinces that have signed interprovincial agreements with Quebec, may be exempt from the normal evaluation process, subject to the conditions on the RBQ interprovincial agreements page. Confirm whether an agreement covers your company before you assume any exemption.

The RBQ examination preparation page describes the examinations as follows. The administration examination is intended for potential contractors, either general or specialized, assesses skills relating to the management of a construction company, and a pass lets the person act as administration guarantor for all construction work in all subclasses. The project and site management examination is intended for potential contractors, both general and specialized, and for general owner-builders, and a pass lets the person act as project and site management guarantor for all construction work in all subclasses. The examinations in the carrying out of construction work are intended for potential specialized contractors and owner-builders, there are as many different examinations as there are licence subclasses, and a pass lets the person act as guarantor for all construction work covered by those subclasses. Read the RBQ instructions and results page carefully before showing up at an exam, and use the information sheet and competency profile for each examination to prepare. No opened RBQ page states a pass mark or an exam duration, so confirm both with the RBQ rather than relying on a training provider's figures.

Step 7: Complete and submit the application form

Complete the appropriate form for your company and forward it to the RBQ, along with all the required documents and the necessary fees. If your enterprise is not yet registered with the Registraire des entreprises, the Start a Business service lets you complete the business-creation procedures and obtain the licence in a single step. You may pay an additional fee to have your application handled before anyone else's, but you are eligible for priority processing only if you meet two conditions: you have the required qualifications for the fields or subclasses applied for, either from acquired experience as a guarantor within the past five years or from successful completion of a training program recognized by the RBQ, and your licence application is complete, including the form, the full payment amount, and the licence security. You are not eligible for priority processing if your competency needs to be assessed through examinations or a professional file, or if your application is covered by an interprovincial agreement. The RBQ fee structure page opened on November 4, 2026 stated only that processing times were longer than usual, with priority applications received October 15, 2026 and regular applications received September 28, 2026 then being processed, and stated no fee amounts. Confirm the current fees before you submit.

As a licence holder you will also need to deal with other organizations, including the Commission de la construction du Québec for labour management, hiring, and collective agreements if you hire workers, and the Commission des normes, de l'équité, de la santé et de la sécurité du travail for accident prevention and safety standards on construction sites. Budget for those obligations from the start rather than discovering them after the licence arrives.

Figures and details not verified on the opened official pages

No licence application fee, examination fee, recognized-training fee, professional file fee, priority processing fee, pass mark, exam duration, licence term, or renewal period is stated on the opened RBQ pages used for this guide, and none is stated here. The opened pages also do not state an application processing time beyond the processing-date notices quoted above, or the current list of acceptable licence security providers. Confirm all fees, exam details, and renewal steps with the RBQ before you apply or pay. Fee and pass-mark figures published by training providers and other non-official sites were not used.

Related guides:

• How to Get a Contractor Licence in BC
• How to Get a Contractor Licence in Ontario
• Contractor Licence Cost in Ontario

Sources

• Régie du bâtiment du Québec, All the steps for obtaining a licence — the licence requirement and exemptions, the licence versus competency certificate distinction, the electrical and plumbing corporation routes, legal form and Registraire des entreprises registration, subclass selection, criminal history declarations for officers and lenders, the licence security and Guarantee Plan table and the $40,000 and $20,000 security amounts, the GCR accreditation rule, the four qualification fields and guarantor rules, the three evaluation methods and the five-year exemption, the interprovincial agreement note, the application form step, and the priority processing eligibility rules.
• Régie du bâtiment du Québec, Preparation for examinations — the administration, project and site management, and carrying out of construction work examinations, what a pass in each one authorizes, and the subclass list including 1.1.1, 1.1.2, 1.2 and 1.3.
• Régie du bâtiment du Québec, Fee structure and fines — the processing-date notices as of November 4, 2026, and the absence of fee amounts on the opened page, which is why this guide states no fee figures.
• Régie du bâtiment du Québec, Licence application forms — the licence application forms by legal form: Contractor's Licence for a natural person, legal person, or partnership, and Owner-Builder's Licence.