Oregon to Rhode Island: master plumber license reciprocity

Rhode Island issues a statewide Master Plumber license through the same DLT Board of Examiners of Plumbers (R.I. Gen. Laws §§ 5-20-3, 5-20-8, 5-20-16). A master’s license is required to engage in the plumbing business; journeypersons work under a master (§§ 5-20-8, 5-20-9). Firms need a contractor master under § 5-20-12.1 in addition to the individual master — that contractor-master credential is not this file’s master level. Licenses are issued on examination (§ 5-20-21). Chapter 20 has no reciprocity or endorsement section, and DLT’s plumber pages list no partner states and no exam waiver. DLT administers the plumber exams itself. Irrigator and water-filtration master licenses are separate.

Oregon has no master plumber license and no other person-held plumbing credential above journeyman. ORS 693.095 permits the State Plumbing Board to adopt rules for a 'supervising plumber' license, but no such rule exists in OAR chapter 918, division 695, and the Building Codes Division's license table lists only the Journeyman Plumber (JP) and three limited specialty licenses (residential water-heater, water-treatment and solar heating and cooling installer) as individual plumbing licenses; the Journeyman Plumber is therefore the highest license an individual can hold. The business-side credential is the Plumbing Business (PB) license under ORS 447.040, issued by the Building Codes Division to a firm that already holds a Construction Contractors Board (CCB) license: the owner or corporate officer files the Contractor/Business License Application (form 440-2888) with a $150 non-refundable fee and the CCB number, no signing supervisor or qualifying-person experience is designated for a plumbing business, no exam is taken, and the license renews on a three-year cycle (all PB licenses next expire July 1, 2029). A plumbing business license 'does not authorize the contractor to work as a journeyman plumber,' and the business may not let anyone perform journeyman work without an individual JP license. An out-of-state master plumber therefore has nothing to transfer to at this level: to work with the tools they obtain the Journeyman Plumber license through the journeyman path (Idaho or Montana reciprocity, or experience credit plus the Oregon exam), and to contract they register a business with the Secretary of State, license it with the CCB, and add the $150 BCD Plumbing Business license.