Washington Contractor License Lookup Scraper

Export public Washington State L&I Verify contractor and business records from secure.lni.wa.gov/verify.

Use this Apify Actor to search Washington contractor registrations, tradesperson records, UBI numbers, and workers' compensation account references, then save structured records for compliance checks, lead generation, insurance workflows, and marketplace onboarding.

Overview

Washington Contractor License Lookup Scraper turns the public Washington Department of Labor & Industries Verify lookup into a repeatable dataset export.

The actor searches the same public Verify system that users access in a browser, but it returns clean JSON records instead of requiring manual copy and paste.

Each result can include license status, license number, UBI number, business location, expiration dates, specialties, bond counts, insurance counts, owner/principal names, and public compliance flags.

It is designed for teams that need to verify many Washington contractors or keep a recurring contractor compliance list up to date.

What it extracts

The actor can save the following fields when Washington L&I returns them:

• Business or contractor name
• Contractor license or registration number
• Washington UBI number
• Workers' comp account reference when available
• License status
• License type
• Contractor type and contractor group
• Specialty names
• Effective date
• Expiration date
• Suspend date
• Business type
• Phone number
• Street address
• City
• State
• ZIP code
• County
• Safety violation flag
• Contractor violation flag
• Workers' comp display status
• Bond count
• Insurance count
• Lawsuit count
• Warrant count
• Violation count
• Bond summary records
• Insurance summary records
• Owner and principal summary records
• Source URL
• Original query
• Search type
• Scrape timestamp

Who is it for

Use this actor if you work with Washington construction or trade businesses and need public license verification at scale.

Who should use it

This actor is built for buyers who need repeatable Washington contractor verification instead of one-off browser checks.

Common users include:

• Contractor marketplaces
• Construction lead-generation teams
• Insurance brokers
• Surety bond teams
• Lenders
• Compliance analysts
• Procurement teams
• Property management companies
• Vendor onboarding teams
• Background-check and due-diligence teams

Business use cases

Contractor lead generation

Search broad terms such as roofing, construction, electric, or local business names to build a prospect list from public L&I records.

License verification

Search a contractor license number and confirm status, expiration date, license type, specialties, and source URL.

Insurance and bond checks

Fetch detailed records to review bond and insurance counts and returned policy summaries.

Marketplace onboarding

Use the dataset as an automated check before a Washington contractor is approved for a marketplace, vendor network, or customer referral workflow.

Recurring compliance monitoring

Schedule the actor to run monthly or weekly with your saved contractor list and compare current statuses against previous exports.

Input options

Search queries

queries is a list of values to search.

Examples:

["construction", "roofing", "electric"]

For exact lookups, provide the exact identifier and select the matching search type.

Search type

searchType controls the Washington L&I search mode.

Supported values:

• Name — business name, contractor name, or last name
• LicenseId — contractor or tradesperson license number
• Ubi — Washington UBI number
• AccountId — workers' comp account number

Maximum records

maxItems limits the total number of dataset records saved across all queries.

Use a small number for tests and a larger number for production exports.

Results per request

pageSize controls the internal L&I result page size.

The default is suitable for most users.

Fetch detailed records

includeDetails controls whether the actor calls the detail endpoint for every result.

Keep it enabled when you need dates, addresses, bonds, insurance, owners, and compliance counts.

Disable it only when you need a very fast search-list export.

Active only

activeOnly skips non-active detailed statuses.

Leave it disabled for audits because expired, inactive, suspended, or archived records can be important.

Example input: contractor discovery

{
  "queries": ["construction", "roofing", "electric"],
  "searchType": "Name",
  "maxItems": 100,
  "pageSize": 50,
  "includeDetails": true,
  "activeOnly": false
}

Example input: exact license lookup

{
  "queries": ["CONSTAI083L5"],
  "searchType": "LicenseId",
  "maxItems": 1,
  "includeDetails": true
}

Example input: UBI lookup

{
  "queries": ["601378957"],
  "searchType": "Ubi",
  "maxItems": 5,
  "includeDetails": true
}

Example output

{
  "businessName": "CONSTRUCTION AHEAD INC",
  "licenseNumber": "CONSTAI083L5",
  "ubiNumber": "601378957",
  "status": "ACTIVE",
  "licenseType": "Construction Contractor",
  "contractorType": "General/Specialty Contractor",
  "specialties": ["GENERAL"],
  "effectiveDate": "06/25/1992",
  "expirationDate": "11/05/2027",
  "city": "Richland",
  "state": "WA",
  "zipCode": "99352",
  "bondCount": 1,
  "insuranceCount": 1,
  "sourceUrl": "https://secure.lni.wa.gov/verify/Detail.aspx?UBI=601378957&LIC=CONSTAI083L5&SAW=False",
  "query": "CONSTAI083L5",
  "searchType": "LicenseId",
  "scrapedAt": "2026-07-05T00:00:00.000Z"
}

Output fields explained

businessName is the name returned by Washington L&I.

licenseNumber is the contractor, tradesperson, or registration identifier.

ubiNumber is the Washington Unified Business Identifier when present.

status is the detailed L&I license status when details are enabled.

licenseType and contractorType describe the Washington license category.

specialties lists specialty classifications returned by L&I.

effectiveDate, expirationDate, and suspendDate support compliance timing checks.

hasSafetyViolation and hasContractorViolation are public flags from the search result.

bondCount, insuranceCount, lawsuitCount, warrantCount, and violationCount summarize related compliance sections.

bonds, insurances, and owners contain sanitized summary arrays from the detail record.

sourceUrl links back to the public L&I detail page.

Data source

The data source is Washington L&I Verify.

The actor uses public endpoints behind the public Verify pages:

• Search results endpoint
• Business details endpoint

No account or private credential is required.

Why use this instead of manual search

Manual Verify searches are fine for a single contractor.

They are slow for a portfolio, marketplace, insurer, or compliance list.

This actor lets you run the same checks in bulk and export the data to JSON, CSV, Excel, or API integrations.

Scheduling

You can schedule the actor in Apify to monitor known contractors.

Recommended recurring workflows:

• Weekly active-license checks
• Monthly insurance and bond review
• Quarterly vendor file refresh
• Pre-onboarding exact license checks

Integrations

The output dataset can be consumed from:

• Apify Console downloads
• Apify API
• Webhooks
• Zapier or Make
• Internal ETL jobs
• BI tools
• CRM enrichment workflows

API usage

Start a run with the Apify API and read the default dataset after the run succeeds.

Node.js API example

import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

const client = new ApifyClient({ token: process.env.APIFY_TOKEN });

const input = {
  queries: ['roofing'],
  searchType: 'Name',
  maxItems: 25,
  includeDetails: true,
};

const run = await client.actor('automation-lab/washington-contractor-license-lookup-scraper').call(input);
const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems({ limit: 3 });
console.log(items);

Python API example

from apify_client import ApifyClient

client = ApifyClient("YOUR_TOKEN")
run = client.actor("automation-lab/washington-contractor-license-lookup-scraper").call(run_input={
    "queries": ["roofing"],
    "searchType": "Name",
    "maxItems": 25,
    "includeDetails": True,
})

items = list(client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).iterate_items())
print(items[:3])

cURL API example

curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/automation-lab~washington-contractor-license-lookup-scraper/runs?token=YOUR_TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"queries":["roofing"],"searchType":"Name","maxItems":25,"includeDetails":true}'

MCP usage

Use Apify MCP when you want Claude Code, Claude Desktop, Cursor, VS Code, or another MCP client to run this actor directly.

The required actor-specific MCP server URL is:

https://mcp.apify.com?tools=automation-lab/washington-contractor-license-lookup-scraper

Claude Code MCP setup

$claude mcp add apify "https://mcp.apify.com?tools=automation-lab/washington-contractor-license-lookup-scraper"

Claude Desktop, Cursor, and VS Code MCP setup

Add this server to your MCP client configuration and replace YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN with your Apify API token.

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "apify": {
      "url": "https://mcp.apify.com?tools=automation-lab/washington-contractor-license-lookup-scraper",
      "headers": {
        "Authorization": "Bearer YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN"
      }
    }
  }
}

In VS Code, use the same JSON server definition in your MCP settings. In Cursor, add it under MCP servers. In Claude Desktop, add it to the app MCP configuration and restart the client.

Example prompts:

• "Run the Washington Contractor License Lookup Scraper for license CONSTAI083L5 and summarize whether the contractor is active."
• "Search Washington L&I for roofing contractors and return the first 20 active records with expiration dates."
• "Check these UBI numbers against Washington L&I Verify and flag missing bond or insurance records."

Use exact license searches for deterministic assistant workflows.

Use name searches for discovery and lead workflows.

How much does it cost to scrape Washington contractor license records?

This actor uses pay-per-event pricing.

There is a small run start charge and a per-record charge for each saved license record.

You are charged only for records the actor saves to the dataset, plus the run start event.

Use maxItems to control cost.

Cost control tips

Start with a small maxItems value.

Use LicenseId or Ubi for exact verification.

Disable includeDetails only when search-list fields are enough.

Keep pageSize near the default unless you have a specific reason to tune it.

Related scrapers

Other automation-lab scrapers that can support public-record, licensing, or local-market workflows:

• Washington Contractor License Lookup Scraper
• Google Maps Reviews Scraper
• Yelp Business Scraper
• Website Contact Finder

Limitations

The actor returns data that Washington L&I makes available through Verify.

It does not infer private information.

It does not guarantee that a contractor is suitable for your project.

Always review official source pages for high-risk decisions.

Search result ordering is controlled by Washington L&I.

Some records may not have every optional field.

Legality

The actor accesses public Washington L&I Verify pages and public JSON endpoints without login, authentication bypass, or private credentials.

Legal and compliance note

This actor accesses public government records.

You are responsible for using the data in compliance with applicable laws, contracts, and internal policies.

Do not use the output for unlawful discrimination or decisions that require additional regulated procedures.

FAQ

Can I search multiple contractor names at once?

Yes. Add multiple values to queries; the actor deduplicates records by license, UBI, violation ID, or business/location key.

Does this require a Washington L&I account?

No. It uses public Verify data.

Why are some fields empty?

Washington L&I does not return every field for every record, and details can be disabled in the input.

Troubleshooting

If you get no records, check that the search type matches the query.

A license number should use LicenseId.

A UBI should use Ubi.

A broad company keyword should use Name.

If a field is missing, it was not returned by Washington L&I for that record or details were disabled.

Changelog

Initial version: searches Washington L&I Verify by name, license, UBI, or account ID and exports detailed contractor/license records.

Support

If a run fails or a record looks wrong, include the run ID, input JSON, and expected public Verify result when contacting support.