California to Georgia: journeyman plumber license reciprocity

Georgia issues a statewide Journeyman Plumber license through the Construction Industry Licensing Board's Division of Master and Journeyman Plumbers. Rule 121-3-.02 is the only CILB licensing rule that creates both master and journeyman credentials (electrical and conditioned-air rules license contractors only). A journeyman applicant must document at least one year of Primary or Secondary plumbing experience covered by the Georgia State Plumbing Code, score at least 70 on the Division's journeyman examination, name three licensed plumbers as references, and pay the Board's published application fee. Primary experience is direct installation under a licensed Master Plumber; secondary examples include county water/public-works maintenance work and full-time municipal or county plumbing inspection. Medical-gas piping is a separate statewide certificate (Rule 121-2-.11) available only to a current Georgia master or journeyman. Rule 121-2-.03 lets the Division issue a journeyman license by reciprocity or endorsement under a formal written agreement with another state board whose exam is substantially equal and who extend a similar privilege to Georgia licensees; the rules pages name no partner states. Everyone else applies by examination, with out-of-state hours counting toward the one-year experience minimum. Application-fee amounts, the exam vendor, CE hours and the renewal cycle are published on sos.ga.gov pages that returned 403 on this date.

California does not issue a statewide journeyman plumber or master plumber license. The only state plumbing credential is the C-36 Plumbing Contractor classification from the Contractors State License Board (CSLB), which is a contractor license qualified by a named individual, not a personal tradesperson card. Business and Professions Code §7053 takes wage employees outside the Contractors State License Law, so a plumber who works for a C-36 contractor needs no CSLB license; California's personal electrician certification (Labor Code §108) has no plumbing counterpart. Some cities and counties still examine and card journeyman plumbers (certificate of competency / journey-level plumber) for work in that jurisdiction. Those cards are not statewide, are not issued by CSLB, and an out-of-state journeyman plumber license is not recognized by any state board. An arriving journeyman should ask the building department where the job is whether a local plumber card is required and sit that city's exam; contracting independently requires a C-36 license, described at the master level.