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Checking a guard or a security company in Rhode Island

This page is for whoever is doing the checking — a client, a property manager, a company vetting a subcontractor. It tells you what a guard and a guard company are supposed to hold in Rhode Island, and walks you to Rhode Island Office of the Attorney General’s own records to confirm it.

tessura is not a Rhode Island agency and issues nothing. Every link below goes to the regulator, and the regulator’s answer is the one that counts.

Getting licensed yourself instead? The Rhode Island requirements, training hours, and application steps →

Check the guard

Rhode Island registers guards through their employer rather than issuing a card to the guard, which changes what you can check.

What they should hold

Every guard working a postSecurity Guard Employee Registration (Attorney General BCI)

Armed work: Armed work requires a Rhode Island pistol permit through the Attorney General (21+, demonstrated need, fingerprints, employer documentation), valid 4 years.

How to check it

  1. Ask the guard which licensed security guard company employs them, plus their full legal name and date of hire.
  2. Email Securitylicensing@riag.ri.gov and ask the Bureau of Criminal Identification to confirm the person is on the registered list for that company.
  3. Cite the statute in your email — R.I. Gen. Laws § 5-5.1-18(a) requires the Attorney General to "keep and make available for public inspection a list of all persons who have been registered or licensed and the name of the company employing the person". This is a public record you are entitled to, not a favour.
  4. If you get no reply, call the Attorney General’s office on (401) 274-4400 and ask for the Bureau of Criminal Identification, security guard licensing.
  5. Confirm in writing both that the registration is current and that the company BCI names matches the company that sent you the guard.
Why there is no link to click

Rhode Island registers individual guards but publishes no online lookup. riag.ri.gov/securityguardlicense offers only the business-licence application and the Securitylicensing@riag.ri.gov address, and the roughly 90 "active security guard licenses" it mentions are company licences. Individual records are statutorily public but only on request: R.I. Gen. Laws § 5-5.1-18(a) obliges the Attorney General to keep the list of registered persons, and the name of each employing company, open to public inspection.

Securitylicensing@riag.ri.gov, or RI Office of the Attorney General, 150 South Main Street, Providence RI 02903, (401) 274-4400.

Check the company

Rhode Island Office of the Attorney General, Bureau of Criminal Identification licenses the firm itself here. This is the check most people skip, and it is usually the more important of the two.

What the firm must holdPrivate Security Guard Business LicenseIssued by Rhode Island Office of the Attorney General, Bureau of Criminal Identification

How to check it

  1. Ask the company for the exact legal name on its licence. Rhode Island Office of the Attorney General, Bureau of Criminal Identification does not publish licence numbers here, so the name is what you can actually match.
  2. Rhode Island Office of the Attorney General, Bureau of Criminal Identification publishes no public per-company lookup, so this cannot be done online.
  3. Contact Rhode Island Office of the Attorney General, Bureau of Criminal Identification directly and ask them to confirm the licence status for that exact legal name. Ask for the answer in writing if the contract is significant.
  4. Meanwhile, ask the company for a copy of the licence itself and check that the name on it matches the entity that will sign your contract.

Rhode Island Office of the Attorney General, Bureau of Criminal Identification names the firms it licenses but publishes no licence number, so a number a company gives you cannot be matched against the state list. Match on the legal name instead.

Ask for insurance properly

A licence says the state let them operate. Insurance is what stands between you and a claim, and it is the easier of the two to fake — a certificate is only true on the day it was printed.

Rhode Island requires it by law

$300,000 for bodily or personal injury and $100,000 property damage, from a Rhode Island-licensed carrier. Unusually prescriptive on endorsements: assault and battery; personal injury including false arrest, libel, slander and invasion of privacy; damage to property in the licensee’s care, custody and control; and errors and omissions.

A filing statute on its face: the licensee files the certificate with the Attorney General, and the certificate must provide that the insurance will not be modified or cancelled unless 30 days’ prior notice is given to the Attorney General. The duty rides on the certificate, so the carrier is bound.

If it lapses: Cover is a continuing condition of the licence, but chapter 5-5.1 spells out no automatic suspension or cure period.

R.I. Gen. Laws §5-5.1-22 — https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE5/5-5.1/5-5.1-22.htm

A certificate of insurance (COI) that names your business as an additional insured, not just the certificate holderCertificate holder means you were mailed a copy. Additional insured means their policy actually answers for you if you are pulled into a claim.
General liability, and workers’ compensation at your state’s statutory limitsIf a guard is hurt on your property and the company carries no workers’ comp, the claim tends to land on you. Ask for commercial auto too if they run patrol vehicles.
The policy number and the effective and expiry dates, on a certificate dated within the last monthAn undated or months-old certificate is the single most common tell. The dates let you ask the insurer about the right policy.
The name, agency, and direct phone number of the broker who issued it — then call themThe broker can confirm the policy is in force today. The certificate PDF cannot, and a forged or stale one looks identical to a real one.
A contract term requiring written notice to you before the policy is cancelled or non-renewedStandard certificates promise notice to the insured, not to you. Putting the duty on the company in the contract is what makes a mid-term cancellation a breach.
A fresh certificate part-way through the term, not only at signingRe-asking at 60 or 90 days costs you an email and defeats the whole get-the-COI-then-drop-it pattern.

tessura does not verify anyone’s insurance and has no access to insurers’ records. This is guidance for doing it yourself, not a statement about any company on this site. It is also not legal advice — for a contract of any size, have your own counsel or broker set the limits.

Where this comes from

Rhode Island requirements last reviewed August 28, 2026. Some details on this state are still pending a second check against the primary source. Rules change — the regulator’s page is authoritative if it disagrees with ours.

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