District of Columbia · Checked October 22, 2026
Your license is the Home Care Agency License (22-B DCMR Ch. 39) — non-medical-only lane: Home Support Agency licence (22-B DCMR Ch. 99, §9900), issued by DC Health (Department of Health), Health Regulation and Licensing Administration (HRLA).
Checked in part. Ch. 39 fees, insurance minima, governing-body/Director and DC-office rules are primary from the DC Register text, and the Home Support Agency lane is primary from a January 2026 HRLA survey document. Marked partial because (1) the Ch. 39 fee section retrieved is the 2004 final rulemaking — no newer HRLA fee schedule was retrieved to confirm the $600/tiered figures are unchanged, and (2) the Ch. 99 Home Support Agency application fee and full text were not retrieved, so an HSA-only founder's exact fee is unpublished here. Anything the state does not publish is printed as "Not published" below — never filled from blogs or consultancy tables. Confirm on the agency page before you budget.
| Item | District of Columbia |
|---|---|
| License / registration | Home Care Agency License (22-B DCMR Ch. 39) — non-medical-only lane: Home Support Agency licence (22-B DCMR Ch. 99, §9900) |
| Issued by | DC Health (Department of Health), Health Regulation and Licensing Administration (HRLA) — official page |
| Application / initial fee | $600 — 22-B DCMR Ch. 39 §3902.1 (DC Register final rulemaking, 19 Mar 2004, still the cited Ch. 39 fee section): Initial Application $600 for a Home Care Agency. This $600 is the application fee, not the total first-year cost — the census-based annual fee in feeRenewalNote is also charged. The Home Support Agency (non-medical) fee under Ch. 99 was not published in the sources retrieved, so do not assume the Ch. 39 $600 applies to an HSA application; verify with HRLA for the HSA lane. |
| Renewal | $400 |
| Surety bond | No state bond minimum found in the published rules |
| Liability insurance | $1,000,000 per incident blanket malpractice insurance for all professional employees, AND $1,000,000 per occurrence general liability insurance covering property damage, bodily injury, libel and slander, plus product liability insurance when applicable — 22-B DCMR Ch. 39 §3901.1. One of the few jurisdictions in this batch with state-set dollar minima. |
| Timeline | Not published |
| Administrator | Each home care agency must have a governing body that adopts bylaws and operating policies, designates a qualified Home Care Director under §3904, and evaluates agency policies at least annually including patient feedback and complaint review (§3903). The agency must maintain an operating office in the District, staffed at least 8 hours per day Monday-Friday, holding the records for all District patients (§3900.5-3900.6). Home Support Agencies are surveyed against Ch. 99 §9900.2, which likewise requires licensure and compliance with Ch. 31 licensing/inspection rules. |
| State extras | The $1M/$1M insurance programme in §3901 is a real first-year cost, plus a staffed District office (home-based operation is not contemplated by §3900.5), a Basic Business License from the Department of Licensing and Consumer Protection, and criminal background checks for health occupations staff. |
| Service | Under this license |
|---|---|
| Companionship & supervision | Covered |
| Homemaker help | Covered |
| Hands-on personal care | Covered |
| Live-in / 24-hour care | Not covered by this license |
| Transportation | Not covered by this license |
| Skilled nursing or therapy | Covered — same license |
A licensed Home Care Agency must provide at least one of the §3900.4 services: skilled nursing, physical therapy, occupational therapy, speech-language pathology, intravenous therapy, medical social services, or home health aide / personal care aide services — so a purely non-medical offer fits the personal care aide prong, but in current HRLA practice non-medical agencies are licensed and surveyed as Home Support Agencies under Ch. 99 (e.g. HSA-0066, a Home Instead franchise, surveyed 2 Jan 2026 for operating before its provisional HSA licence issued). A home care agency is a service agency delivering care under physician-approved plans of care (D.C. Official Code §44-501(7)); it is not a nurse staffing agency, which merely furnishes personnel and may not deploy CNAs/HHAs into homes.
For the Home Care Agency licence itself, skilled and unskilled sit in the SAME licence: §44-501(7) / Ch. 39 cover skilled and psychiatric nursing, monitoring, PT, speech, OT, IV therapy, medical social services, nutritional/social services and personal care overseen by an RN or other health professional, delivered under a plan of care approved by the patient's physician. The separate licence is the non-medical-only Home Support Agency (Ch. 99) — i.e. in DC the split runs the opposite way from most states: one combined licence for anything clinical, a lighter licence for non-medical only.
Enrol with the Department of Health Care Finance (DHCF) as a Medicaid home care / Elderly and Persons with Physical Disabilities (EPD) Waiver and State Plan personal care provider after HRLA licensure; agencies serving Medicare or DC Medicaid patients must also meet that programme's Conditions of Participation (Ch. 39 §3900.2).
EVV required for Medicaid personal care / home health visits under the federal Cures Act; DC operates a hybrid model (Sandata aggregator in national EVV listings).
The state fee above is one line of the real total. Run the true-cost calculator with District of Columbia selected — it adds the bond premium, insurance class, screening and the payroll runway your first hires create.
This page is information, not legal advice. Confirm before you file: the agency — not this page — decides your application.
The free checkers give you the verdict and the number. The Kit gives you the working papers: your state's application packet walked through in filing order, the policies-and-procedures binder spec (what your binder must contain — never a boilerplate binder), the administrator self-audit, the insurance & bond spec sheet, the Medicaid gate map, the franchise-vs-independent 10-year worksheets, and the payroll-runway planner.
$49 one-time payment
Included in the $49 HomeCareLicenseCheck Kit
