This bill amends RCW 18.170.030, 18.170.040, and 18.170.165 and adds a new section to chapter 18.170 RCW to shift payment of private security licensing fees from individual applicants to private security companies. The text shown removes language that required applicants to pay nonrefundable application fees, fees for armed endorsements, and transfer fees when changing companies, and creates a new statutory requirement that the employing or hiring private security company pay application, license renewal, and endorsement fees for its employees or persons who have an offer of employment. The new section requires the company to provide a billing pin that the employee or prospective employee will submit on application, renewal, or endorsement forms and forbids companies from requiring employees to reimburse those fees or deducting the costs from wages. Enforcement in the new section is a $500 monetary penalty per violation enforced by "the department," and the director may suspend or revoke a company's license for subsequent violations. The act takes effect November 1, 2026. Applicant eligibility and application requirements preserved or restated include minimum ages (18 for guards, 21 for armed endorsements), U.S. citizenship or resident alien status, training and fitness standards as determined by the director, fingerprint submission (with an exception for recent private investigator licensure), and inclusion of the company billing pin on applications; armed endorsement applicants must also have a current firearms certificate issued by the commission. The text refers to "the director," "the department," and "the commission" but does not identify the specific agency names or provide procedural details for enforcement, notice, or appeals. The bill removes fee-payment language from the cited RCWs but does not include full fee-setting authority, current fee schedules beyond the bill's findings, or other cross-referenced provisions that may appear elsewhere in statute.

If enacted, the bill shifts the direct cost of private security licensing from individual guards to their employers: private security companies must pay the application, renewal, and endorsement fees for every hired person or person who has received a job offer, and must give each worker a billing pin to use on forms. Practically, this means employers will need to budget for per-employee fees that were previously paid by workers (the bill notes current fees are about $101 initial and $95 renewal), cannot recoup those costs by deducting them from wages or forcing employee reimbursement, and will take on new administrative responsibilities to supply billing pins. Companies that fail to comply face a $500 penalty per violation enforced by the department and possible suspension or revocation of their company license for repeated violations, so noncompliance carries both financial and business-license risks. The change becomes effective November 1, 2026. The text does not identify the specific agency names, exact fee schedules beyond the cited amounts, or the detailed enforcement, notice, and appeal procedures, so those operational details remain unclear.