Business Licensing Service and local licensing

Combined licensing streamlines licensing for your city businesses

Did you know more than 90 percent of businesses apply for and renew their licenses online?

The state Business Licensing Service (BLS) offers a "one-stop" local licensing solution to relieve the workload of license renewals. The free service works for more than 100 cities with more joining BLS each month.

Partnership with BLS supports your city staff and business community by removing roadblocks. This saves your local businesses time when they apply for and renew city and state licenses. Your staff, meanwhile, get fast turnaround, detailed reporting and increased compliance – with no added cost.

Our revenues increased 15 percent in the first year. With BLS, we are able to identify our businesses and their employees more easily.

~ Carrie Lewellen, Treasurer, City of Vancouver

Benefits for:

City staff

• No mailings or collections.
• Licenses renewed annually by BLS.
• Payments managed by BLS.
• GIS integration requires licensing in city limits.
• Tax account discovery increases compliance and revenue.
• Local regulatory control.

Businesses

• Intuitive licensing "wizard" for applicants.
• Dedicated licensing customer service phone line.
• No trip to city hall.
• On-demand license printing.

Cities retain local control and sign up for free

As a BLS partner, you will continue to:

• Approve or deny local licenses.
• Close city business endorsements that are out of compliance.

BLS provides its service at no charge to all local governments. Find out more with our brochure, and see the onboarding task timeline, or call our team of experts at 360-705-6777.
 

Decisions due by 2022

In 2017, Lawmakers unanimously approved to have cities add a combined licensing service by the end of 2022 (Chapter 35.90 RCW). Our team is working with Washington cities for a smooth transition for partnering cities. We provided a city onboarding progress report to stakeholders in January 2020.
 

Access ATLAS for local control

ATLAS is Revenue’s combined tax and licensing administration system. Cities access ATLAS through a portal to manage accounts and generate reports in real time. See ATLAS up close in this video on the Association of Washington Cities’ YouTube channel.
 

Types of licenses available with BLS

• General business.
• Employee range.
• Head count (FTE).
• Nonprofit.
• Home occupation.
• Fee exempt.
• Rentals.
• Non-resident (out-of-city businesses).

BLS does not manage local regulatory licenses such as peddler’s licenses and temporary licenses.

Contact us to sign up or learn more about the benefits of partnership. Call 360-705-6777