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West Jordan licenses its own businesses through a licensing office at City Hall and an online application portal. This guide covers the fees on the city's current fee schedule, how to apply and renew, what the fire and zoning checks involve, and when a home business needs a license at all.
If your business sits inside West Jordan city limits, you apply for the city license online through the city's Cityworks portal, and the licensing office emails payment instructions after it reviews your application. The fee schedule lists a $55 one-time application fee, a $163 base fee and $8 per employee, so a first-year license for a business with six employees comes to $266 before any fire inspection or health permit. Renewal invoices are emailed 45 days before your license expires.
West Jordan runs its own licensing office, so a business inside city limits needs a West Jordan license, not a Salt Lake City or county one. A license from one city does not transfer to another. The city's licensing page says you need a new license if you move, buy an existing business, or change your ownership structure.
The licensing office is on the second floor, south side of West Jordan City Hall at 8000 S Redwood Rd. It is open Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., except state and federal holidays. You can reach it at 801-569-5010 or [email protected].
This page covers West Jordan only. For the Salt Lake City process, see our Salt Lake City business license guide, which also explains why Salt Lake County has no single countywide license. For other news from the area, see our West Jordan city page.
These amounts come from the city's Consolidated Fee Schedule, which the city says is effective through June 30, 2027 and was updated June 23, 2026 under Resolution 26-021. The business licensing section lists no inspection fee and no separate renewal fee.
| Fee | Amount | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Business application | $55 | One time |
| Business base fee | $163 | Yearly license; the schedule says business fees are not to exceed $2,000 |
| Business per employee fee | $8 | Per employee |
| Home occupation application | $55 | One time, only when a license is required |
| Home occupation base fee | $40 | When required |
| Late fee, commercial | $30 | If the renewal is not paid by the due date |
| Late fee, residential | $20 | Rental licenses |
| Small vendor license | $182 | Yearly |
| Large vendor license | $249 | Yearly |
| Food truck license | $178 | Secondary permit is $21 |
| Alcohol license | $342 | Plus a $322 one-time application fee and a $1,000 bond |
| Pawn shop | $215 | Listed on the fee schedule |
| Rental dwelling, standard | $325 | Per rental unit; the Good Landlord Program rental license is $50 per unit |
| Short-term rental license | $325 | Per rental unit |
Take a salon with six employees. The first year is the $55 application, the $163 base fee and six employees at $8, or $48. That is $266 in city license fees. The schedule lists the application as a one-time fee, so a renewal should invoice at $211, but the invoice is the final word.
A home business that the city requires to be licensed pays $55 plus $40, or $95. Those figures are city fees only. A salon also needs a Salt Lake County Health Department permit, and the fire inspection described below is separate.
New applications go through the city's Cityworks portal, linked from the business licensing page as Apply for a Business License. You register an account, then choose the Commercial Business Application, the Home Occupation Application, or the Rental Dwelling Application. The city reviews it, and Cityworks then emails payment instructions. You log in, choose Actions, and pay. The city takes debit, Visa, Discover and Mastercard, and says it does not accept American Express.
If you registered and no confirmation email arrives within a few minutes, check spam, then call 801-569-5010. The city asks you to have these ready:
The city emails a renewal invoice 45 days before your license expires. You can pay by mail, in person, or by phone with cash, check, Visa or Mastercard, and the renewal portal is the same Cityworks login used for applications. If you closed the business or the invoice looks wrong, call or email the licensing office instead of ignoring it.
Do not let it slide. The fee schedule lists a $30 late fee for commercial licenses. Under city code, a licensee whose renewal fee and penalties stay unpaid for 30 calendar days from the original due date has to stop operating until the city approves reinstatement or issues a new license. The code also says a license year runs twelve months from the date it starts, so your renewal date is not necessarily January 1, and a license expires 120 calendar days after you continuously close the business.
West Jordan code says a new business cannot get a license until the required inspections for zoning, building, fire and health pass, and that licensed places of business are inspected again periodically. The licensing page says that if an inspection applies to you, the inspection department contacts you to schedule it.
The Fire Department says a fire inspection is required for any new business license, so expect one before the license issues. You can reach Fire Administration at 801-260-7300. The fee schedule lists fire inspection fees in tiers by employee count (0 to 10, 11 to 50, and more than 50), and the entry shows two sets of amounts, so ask the Fire Department which applies to you before you budget.
Some trades need sign-off from other agencies, and the city's page says you contact them yourself. The Salt Lake County Health Department (788 E Wood Oak Lane in Murray, 385-468-3860) handles permits for beauty and nail salons, massage, food service, and medical or dental offices. Businesses that put grease, oils or chemicals down the drain, such as restaurants and auto repair shops, contact the South Valley Water Reclamation Facility at 7495 S 1300 W, 801-566-7711.
West Jordan changed its home business rule in late 2025. Ordinance 25-52, passed October 28, 2025, says a home occupation needs a West Jordan general business license only if it is not on the permitted home occupation list in zoning code section 13-11-3, or if the city decides it will have a combined offsite impact that materially exceeds your household's. A home business that does not need a license can still request one by filing an application and paying the application fee.
The ordinance names five cases it treats as too impactful to skip the license: in-home child or adult care and preschools, any business that draws more than ten vehicle trips a day (package deliveries, client visits and employee trips all count), a business with more than two employees who live elsewhere but work in the home, any business that has to pass a fire inspection, and anything the city finds after a neighbor complaint and an inspection. Every home business must meet the zoning standards in Title 13, Chapter 11, licensed or not, and home occupation applications go to the zoning administrator for review before a license issues.
The home occupation standards, as adopted in Ordinance 24-01 in January 2024, are specific. The business can use at most 25 percent of any floor, up to 500 square feet total across the house, garage and any outbuilding. You must live there. You can have two employees who live elsewhere. Inventory cannot take more than half the allowed space. You get one unlit sign of 2 square feet or less, one work vehicle of up to 12,000 pounds plus one trailer, and up to six customers an hour. Deliveries and customer visits are barred from 10 p.m. to 7 a.m., and sales must be by appointment, not a retail storefront. Confirm these against the current code with the city before you rely on them.
A license puts your name in city records. It does not bring in customers. Set up a free Google Business Profile with the same name and address as your license, and list the business in our Local Directory. If you own taxable equipment, our guide to Salt Lake County business personal property tax covers the separate county filing.
We publish The Salt Lake Valley, a free local newsletter with about 2,400 subscribers, and we sell ads in it, so weigh this with that in mind. Our menu today lists SLV The Closer at $149 a month and SLV Neighbor at $179 a month, and our advertising page shows what each includes. A new West Jordan shop announcing its opening is the kind of thing those plans are built for.