How Do You Check a Well Driller's License in Texas?

Water Well Drilling Weatherford gets asked this more often than you’d expect, usually by someone who has just paid for a pump that didn’t fix the problem. Checking a well driller’s license in Texas takes a few minutes, and it’s worth doing before any money changes hands.

Step 1: Look up the license

The Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation (TDLR) licenses water well drillers and pump installers. Its public License Search lets you search by name, company or license number and see whether a license is active.

• Drilling, deepening or plugging a water well for pay requires a water well driller license under Occupations Code chapter 1901.
• Installing, pulling or repairing the pump in a well for pay requires a pump installer license under chapter 1902.

Many companies hold both. Some individual techs work under a licensed driller or installer as registered apprentices. Ask who holds the license the work is done under.

Step 2: Check the endorsement

Licenses carry endorsements for the kind of work: water wells, monitoring wells, closed-loop geothermal, single-phase or three-phase pumps, turbines. A driller licensed only for monitoring wells shouldn’t be drilling your house well. Match the endorsement to the job.

Step 3: Look at their past wells

The Texas Water Development Board’s Submitted Drillers Reports database holds well reports filed since 2001, with the company name, driller, license number, location and completion details. Searching near your property shows which companies actually drill in your area. It also shows how deep their wells run, and whether reports are filled out completely. In Parker County, drillers filed 4,746 new household well reports between January 2021 and September 2026, so an active local driller will have a visible track record.

Step 4: Watch for red flags

• No license number on the quote or truck. Ask for it.
• “We’ll register it after.” In the Upper Trinity district, new wells are registered before drilling.
• One lump-sum price with no footage rate, casing type, grout method or pump details.
• No mention of disinfection after work on a drinking-water well, which state rules require unless the owner waives it.
• No State Well Report afterward. The driller must file it and send you a copy within 60 days.

Why it matters

A well is built once and lives in the ground for decades. A poor surface seal can let contamination into the aquifer, a mis-sized pump can fail early, and a well drilled in the wrong spot can violate spacing rules and cause problems when you sell. A licensed driller is accountable to TDLR, and that accountability is part of what you’re paying for. See water well service and residential well drilling.