Looking for a plumber? How do you know who’s qualified to do your work so that it will satisfy the plumbing code requirements of your community? And do it safely? Who’s really up to the job?

Plumbing work is much more than a handyman’s sideline; it can affect your safety, health and property value. The State of Illinois recognizes this by requiring that plumbers be licensed, and then only after approved training and an examination for proficiency. Anyone offering to do plumbing work without having a valid plumbers license is violating the law.

Even for such seemingly simple tasks as replacing a water heater or a faucet, the law requires that any plumber you hire must have a current license. This licensing requirement, says the law, applies to anyone who plans, inspects, installs, alters, extends, repairs or maintains plumbing systems.

Licensed plumbers must display their license numbers in all their advertising and on all their business vehicles so that you know that who you are hiring is someone deemed qualified by the state.

Indeed, licensed plumbers will have earned their licenses only after years of apprenticeship– which includes classroom as well as on-the-job training. Even after qualifying for a license, they must document four hours a year of approved continuing education in order to maintain their license. This is increasingly important as technology in the field becomes more sophisticated and as major trends, such a going green, upgrade accepted practices.

Licenses are issued by the State of Illinois as well as the City of Chicago. In either case, a current license indicates that the holder is qualified both theoretically and practically to implement applicable plumbing codes– and is keeping up with new technology and techniques.

The law further requires that licenses be displayed at plumbers’ places of business and that the license numbers of all licensed plumbers and apprentice plumbers currently employed there are listed in a register at that location.