Trades & Contractors · 6 min read · Last updated
Drain work in Hamilton is mostly emergency work, sold to homeowners with water in the basement and a decision to make quickly. That is exactly why the City licenses the businesses that solicit and perform it. Your firm needs a drain repair contractor licence under Schedule 29 of By-law 07-170, and it cannot be issued until a licensed Drain Repair Master is in your employ.
The City of Hamilton lists this under its “Trades” category: “Drain work includes any work of drain laying, weeping tile installing, septic tank installing, drain reconstruction or repair or removing tree roots or other obstructions from drains or private drain connections.”
Who needs this licence?
The licence covers businesses doing drain work, which the by-law defines broadly: drain laying, weeping tile installing, septic tank installing, drain reconstruction or repair, and removing tree roots or other obstructions from drains or private drain connections.
That definition sweeps in more than excavation. A company that only snakes roots out of private drain connections is doing licensed drain work, even though it never digs a trench.
The licence belongs to the business that solicits and performs the work. The individual on the truck who has qualified in the trade holds a separate drain repair master licence, and the two licences are not interchangeable.
The gating requirement is that the contractor licence cannot be issued until the business has a licensed Drain Repair Master in its employ. Since no master may be employed by more than one contractor at a time, your master has to be genuinely yours, not shared with another firm.
Schedule 29 of By-law 07-170 holds the full definitions, requirements and restrictions for drain work.
What documents do you need?
The drain contractor checklist is lean and starts with the business rather than a form. A business registration or corporate profile dated within one year of the application establishes who owns the company.
Liability and property damage insurance of two million dollars comes next. Drain work involves excavation close to foundations, buried services and neighbouring property, and the consequences of getting it wrong land on someone else's house, so the limit is high.
A Criminal Records and Judicial Matters Check from the police service board in your city of residence, dated within 36 days of the application, is required, and third party clearances are refused.
The licence cannot be issued until you have a licensed Drain Repair Master in your employ. Unlike the building repair contractor licence, no trade questionnaire is listed for this trade, so the master requirement and the insurance limit carry most of the weight.
A municipally issued photo identification card is produced for the licence, so build the photo appointment into your timeline.
Zoning and premises requirements
This licence has no Zoning Verification Certificate, no addendum step and no premise plan. It is a trade licence for a business that works at other people's addresses, so the City is not approving a land use when it issues it.
Zoning still applies to any property you operate from. A yard for excavators, trailers, pipe stock and spoil is subject to the zoning for that land, and outdoor storage is restricted in many zones. Check before you sign a lease on a yard.
At the job itself, the property owner's address governs. Drain work also intersects with the City's rules about private drain connections and the public sewer, which are separate from your business licence and are handled through the relevant permits and approvals for that connection.
So think of it in two layers: your licence lets your business carry on the trade, and each job stands on its own approvals for that property.
Inspections and approvals
The guide lists no inspections for the drain repair contractor licence. Nothing is circulated to fire, health, parking or compliance staff when you apply.
Instead, the City relies on three controls: a qualified master in your employ, insurance at the required limit, and a recent police clearance. For a trade sold under pressure in flooded basements, the qualified master is the real safeguard.
Individual jobs may still require permits and inspection under the rules that apply to drains and private drain connections at that property. Those obligations sit with the work, not with your licence, and your licence does not excuse them.
Because the licence is not inspected, the way it goes wrong is quiet: insurance lapses, or a master leaves and is not replaced. Both are easier to prevent than to fix.
How much does it cost?
A new drain contractor application carries three charges: a processing fee to open the file, a licence fee, and a photo fee for the municipally issued identification card.
HST applies to the processing fee and the photo fee, but not to the licence fee. The contractor licence fee is set higher than the drain repair master licence fee, since it authorises a business to solicit and perform the work.
There is no exam fee on this side of the trade. The examination, and its fee, belong to the master licence.
Renewal is the licence fee plus the photo fee each year, because a new card is printed annually. A licence allowed to expire attracts a reinstatement fee. The City sets all amounts in its fee schedule and confirms them during your application, so ask for the breakdown in writing.
How to apply
Line up your licensed Drain Repair Master first, and confirm they are not currently employed by another contractor, since a master may hold only one contractor relationship at a time.
Arrange liability and property damage insurance at two million dollars in the name of the business that will hold the licence.
Pull a business registration or corporate profile dated within the past year.
Order the Criminal Records and Judicial Matters Check from the police service board where you live so it is within 36 days on the day you file, and remember that a private screening report will be refused.
Submit the application with those documents, pay the processing, licence and photo fees, and attend for the photo so the identification card can be produced. Keep the card with you, since a homeowner deciding on an emergency drain repair has every reason to ask to see it.
Renewals and staying compliant
Renew annually with Declarations A and B completed. Both are required on the contractor side; the master licence requires Declaration B only.
A new municipally issued photo identification card is printed every year with an updated expiry date, and a new picture is required every three years, so the photo fee recurs with each renewal.
Watch the master requirement between renewals. If your licensed Drain Repair Master leaves, the condition the licence was issued on is no longer satisfied, and that is a licensing problem you need to raise rather than wait out.
Keep insurance and licence renewal dates aligned, and renew before expiry, because reinstating a lapsed licence costs considerably more than renewing on time.
Quick quiz: test what you learned
Three questions, all answered in this guide. Click an answer to check it.
1. Which of these is drain work under Hamilton's by-law?
The definition of drain work includes drain laying, weeping tile, septic tanks, drain reconstruction or repair, and removing tree roots or other obstructions from drains or private drain connections.
2. When can a drain repair contractor licence be issued to a business?
The checklist states the licence cannot be issued until the business has a licensed Drain Repair Master in its employ.
3. What level of insurance does the drain contractor checklist require?
The drain repair contractor checklist requires liability and property damage insurance of two million dollars, reflecting the risk of excavation work.
Skip the paperwork
Tell Permits2Go about your business and it assembles the licence application for you — document checklists, e-signatures and a guided workspace for Hamilton, with more cities on the way.
This guide is general information, not legal or professional advice. Licensing requirements, by-laws and fees change and vary by municipality — always confirm the current rules with the City before you apply.