# How to read a DC business license record

> Customer numbers, license activities, statuses, wards and districts, and what is left out.

## How to read these records

### The business and its licenses

The District gives each business a customer number and one license per activity. A record here is one customer
number, with each active license, its end date and the date it was first issued.

### Earlier records

Licenses that are no longer active are counted by the status the file gives them — closed, cancelled, expired,
and the District's own “expired – enforcement” and penalty stages. The file does not say what followed.

### Places

Premises in the District are listed by ward. Businesses located outside DC that hold a DC license are listed
under their own city. Business improvement districts and Main Street programs are those the file gives.

### What is not here

Sole proprietors, individual licenses, owners' and agents' names (the District file has them; this site never
downloads them), one- and two-family rentals, short-term rentals.

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Página: https://dc-business-license-records.pages.dev/how-to-read/
Fonte: https://opendata.dc.gov/datasets/85bf98d3915f412c8a4de706f2d13513
Recolha: 2026-10-01