Checking a guard or a security company in Vermont

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 Vermont, and walks you to Vermont Office of Professional Regulation (Secretary of State)’s own records to confirm it.

tessura is not a Vermont 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 Vermont requirements, training hours, and application steps →

Check the guard

Vermont issues a credential to the guard, so you can check the person in front of you.

What they should hold

Every guard working a postRegistered Security Employeerenews every 2 years

If they work with a dogGuard Dog Handler Specialty Designationstate exam · renews every 2 years

Armed work: Armed designations (registered or licensed) require firearms training with a Vermont-licensed instructor, a completed instructor verification form, and firearms recertification at renewal.

Ask for the number

Three digits, a period, then seven digits. Individuals in this profession start 046, e.g. 046.0010415. A temporary registration carries a suffix such as -FTTP.

Live "Find a Professional" results for surname Smith (168 individual records) returning 046.0010415, 046.0120666, 046.0119486 and 046.0075420-FTTP. The form’s own placeholder is "License Number (123.1234567)".

How to check it

Ask whether the guard holds a Vermont security guard licence or is a "registered security employee" working under a licensed agency, and get their name and number. Most working guards are registered security employees rather than licensed guards.
Open the OPR "Find a Professional" lookup and either enter the number in "License Number (123.1234567)" or fill in First Name and Last Name. Do not use "Business Name" for a person — it disables the name fields and searches agencies only.
Set "Profession (optional)" to "PI & Security Services" to exclude the other fifty-odd Vermont professions, then click "Display Results".
Read the results columns and check that "Profession Type" matches what the guard told you — a client expecting "security guard" and finding "registered security employee" may wrongly think something is wrong.
Open the record and confirm the status is current, the expiration date is in the future, and check the endorsements and any disciplinary action shown.
Separately look up the employing agency by Business Name — a registered security employee may only work supervised by a licensed security guard at a licensed agency, so the individual credential alone is not sufficient.

Open the Vermont OPR "Find a Professional" lookup →

Shows licence status · shows the expiry date.

If the lookup finds nothing: Office of Professional Regulation, 802-828-1505, or the contact form at sos.vermont.gov/opr/find-a-professional/. A full exportable roster is available from the "Profession Roster Download" button in the lookup. Note that Vermont is widely and wrongly described as having no security licensing — it does, and there is a real record to check.

Check the company

Vermont Office of Professional Regulation, Secretary of State 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 holdSecurity Services AgencyIssued by Vermont Office of Professional Regulation, Secretary of State

How to check it

Ask the company for the exact legal name on its licence and its Security Services Agency number. A company that cannot produce a number for a licence it claims to hold has told you something.
Open the Vermont Office of Professional Regulation, Secretary of State lookup and search for that name.
Search the legal name, not the name on the uniform or the invoice. Brand names, DBAs, and the name on the truck are often not the licensed entity.
Read the status and the expiry date, not just the presence of a record. An expired or suspended licence still returns a result.
If nothing comes up, ask which entity holds the licence and in which state, then check that name. If the answer does not resolve, treat the licence as unconfirmed and call Vermont Office of Professional Regulation, Secretary of State before signing.

Open the Vermont Office of Professional Regulation, Secretary of State lookup →

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.

Vermont does not require it

Vermont requires no insurance AND no bond — the only state in the country where that is true. 26 V.S.A. §3172 is exhaustive on its face: an application in proper form, the fee, and evidence of current Vermont business entity registration. That is the entire list.

What that means for you: the licence tells you nothing about whether this company is insured, so the certificate is a purely commercial document with no regulator standing behind it. Everything below matters more here than almost anywhere else.

If it lapses: None. A Vermont guard company that cancels its policy after winning a contract commits no licensing violation whatsoever. Your only leverage is the contract itself.

26 V.S.A. §3172; Admin. Rules 04-030-250 (zero occurrences of "insurance" or "bond") — https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/fullchapter/26/059

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

Vermont requirements last reviewed August 28, 2026. Rules change — the regulator’s page is authoritative if it disagrees with ours.

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