Texas Journeyman PrepGetting licensed in Texas

Checked against primary sources 2026-08-24

Five thousand dollars a day, and a Class C misdemeanor

Two tracks run in parallel here: an administrative one that reaches anybody, and a criminal one with a short list of offenses.

On this page
  1. The administrative penalty reaches unlicensed people too
  2. The published plan, and why there has to be one
  3. The ceiling is somewhere else entirely
  4. Cease and desist, and the civil route
  5. The four criminal offenses, and the ones that are not there
  6. Denial, probation, and the way back
  7. A city can ask for a suspension
  8. The rule side is a cross-reference
  9. What this page cites

The administrative penalty reaches unlicensed people too

The executive director may impose an administrative penalty on a person under Subchapter F, Chapter 51, regardless of whether the person holds a license under this chapter, if the person violates: (1) this chapter or a rule adopted under this chapter; or (2) a rule or order of the executive director or commission.

Tex. Occ. Code 1305.301

Regardless of whether the person holds a license. Not holding one is not a shield.

That phrase is doing real work, because the criminal section next to it is drafted the other way. Tex. Occ. Code 1305.303(a) opens by naming a person subject to this chapter. One track is written to reach outward at anybody doing the work. The other is written around the people the act already governs.

Tex. Occ. Code 1305.301(b) requires the opportunity for a hearing before a penalty is imposed. That is a right to be heard, not a right to delay, and it is the point at which the factors further down this page get argued.

The published plan, and why there has to be one

Texas does not leave the amount to be discovered at the hearing. Under Tex. Occ. Code 51.302(c) the commission adopts a written enforcement plan, by rule or by publication in the Texas Register, giving license holders notice of the ranges of penalties for specific violations and of the criteria by which the department decides the amount.

TDLR publishes one for the electricians program and it sorts violations into four classes.

ClassRange on the department plan
AFine between $500 and $2,000
BFine between $1,000 and $3,500, and up to one year of full suspension
CFine between $2,000 and $5,000, plus one year of probated suspension up to revocation
DFine of $5,000, and revocation

Where the ones people ask about sit: performing electrical work without a license is Class C. Working on an expired license is Class B. Falsifying an application is Class D, the top of the plan, alongside a handful of others.

That ordering repays a second look. Letting a license lapse and carrying on is treated as a smaller matter than never having had one, and lying on the way in is treated as worse than either. The plan is a statement about what the department thinks is dangerous.

It carries no revision date on its page, so read the classes above as they stood on the date at the top of this page and open the live plan before relying on a number.

The ceiling is somewhere else entirely

Chapter 1305 sets no penalty figure of its own, and that absence is what brings in the general provision. Where the law establishing a program does not state a maximum, the penalty is assessed in an amount that may not exceed $5,000 per day for each violation, and each day a violation continues or occurs is a separate violation for the purpose of imposing a penalty (Tex. Occ. Code 51.302(a)).

Per day, per violation. That is how a small matter becomes a large number, and it is why the date a thing started tends to be the most contested fact in these files.

Inside a class, five things set the figure (Tex. Occ. Code 51.302(b)).

The fourth is the one a respondent controls after the fact. Correcting the thing before the hearing is a listed factor, in the statute, not a favor.

Cease and desist, and the civil route

The executive director may issue a cease and desist order where it is necessary to prevent a violation of the chapter and to protect public health and safety (Tex. Occ. Code 1305.302(a)). That is an order stopping the activity rather than a penalty for having done it.

The attorney general or the executive director may bring an action for an injunction or a civil penalty (Tex. Occ. Code 1305.302(b)), and the section that carries the detail is Tex. Occ. Code 51.352.

Three things in it are worth knowing before that route opens. The civil penalty runs to the same ceiling, $5,000 per day for each violation. The action is filed in a district court in Travis County, wherever the work was. And the attorney general and the department may recover reasonable expenses, including court costs, attorney’s fees, investigative costs, witness fees and deposition expenses.

That last one is the part that outruns the penalty. A contested civil action in a county you do not live in, with the other side’s costs attached to the outcome, is a different proposition from an administrative penalty with a stated range.

The four criminal offenses, and the ones that are not there

Tex. Occ. Code 1305.303(a) makes it an offense for a person subject to the chapter to do any of four things.

An offense under that section is a Class C misdemeanor (Tex. Occ. Code 1305.303(b)), which in Texas means a fine not to exceed five hundred dollars and no confinement (Tex. Penal Code 12.23).

Five hundred dollars against five thousand a day tells you which track carries the money. The criminal one carries something else, which is a conviction on a record, and the third and fourth items are aimed at people who are not the electrician: the employer, and whoever signed the form.

The list is four items and it is closed. Everything on it is about licensure or about the training certification. Nothing on it is about how a business presents itself, so the lettering on a van and the wording of an advertisement are outside the criminal section entirely, whatever the department does with them administratively. If somebody tells you otherwise, ask them to read you the paragraph.

Denial, probation, and the way back

A person who violates the chapter, a rule adopted under it, or an order of the executive director or commission is subject to denial of an application or to disciplinary action (Tex. Occ. Code 1305.251). What that action can be is set out on our page about the conduct rules.

One part of it belongs here, because it is the outcome people do not plan for. Where a suspension is probated, the commission may require the person to report regularly to the department on the matters that are the basis of the probation, to limit practice to the areas the commission prescribes, or to continue or renew professional education until the person reaches a degree of skill the commission is satisfied with (Tex. Occ. Code 51.353(b)).

A probated suspension is therefore not a suspended sentence in the ordinary sense. It can come with reporting, a narrowed scope of work, and required education, and it is the standard shape of a Class C outcome on the department plan.

After a revocation, Tex. Occ. Code 1305.254 sets the way back: a license holder whose license has been revoked may apply for a new license after the first anniversary of the date of the revocation. One year, and then an application, not a reinstatement.

A city can ask for a suspension

A municipality or region may request suspension for just cause of the license under this chapter of a license holder working in its jurisdiction.

Tex. Occ. Code 1305.252

One sentence, and it is the whole section. A city cannot suspend your state license itself. It can ask, and the just cause it has to show is not defined in the section.

The rule side is a cross-reference

16 TAC 73.90 sets no penalties of its own. It says that where a person or entity violates Chapter 1305, any provision of 16 TAC Chapter 73, or an order of the executive director or commission, proceedings may be instituted to impose administrative penalties, administrative sanctions, or both, in accordance with Occupations Code Chapters 51 and 1305.

So the whole of Chapter 73 is enforceable, one subsection at a time, and the substance of what follows is in the statutes above rather than in the rules.

What this page cites

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Every rule here is cited to the section it comes from, and corrections are logged in public with the date. This is study material rather than electrical advice, and it does not replace your own code book or your inspector.