Arkansas · Checked October 22, 2026
Your license is the Private Care Agency license (Arkansas Code § 20-10-2301 et seq.; Rules for Private Care Agencies in Arkansas, 20 CAR Part 49), issued by the Arkansas Department of Health, Division of Health Facility Services, issued by Arkansas Department of Health (ADH), Division of Health Facility Services.
Checked in part. SURPRISE / caution: Arkansas's 'private care agency' license is real but its statutory definition is welded to Medicaid — it covers agencies furnishing personal care 'for which the provider seeks reimbursement through the Arkansas Medicaid Program,' and 2025 testimony on SB 120 said licensure/training/background-check standards then applied only to Medicaid-accepting agencies, with extension to private-pay agencies still being debated. Do not market this as a settled license for every private-pay agency without a launch-eve check of the post-Oct. 1, 2026 rules. The license fee amount could not be confirmed in primary rule text and is left null. 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 | Arkansas |
|---|---|
| License / registration | Private Care Agency license (Arkansas Code § 20-10-2301 et seq.; Rules for Private Care Agencies in Arkansas, 20 CAR Part 49), issued by the Arkansas Department of Health, Division of Health Facility Services |
| Issued by | Arkansas Department of Health (ADH), Division of Health Facility Services — official page |
| Application / initial fee | Not published — The Private Care Agency rules (20 CAR § 49-105) prescribe the annual application form and a Dec. 31 calendar-year expiration but the fee amount was not stated in the rule text retrieved from the Arkansas Code of Rules / ADH markup — not published in the sources retrieved, do not invent. A $1,000 figure appears in 2025 legislative testimony as 'a $1,000 licensure fee already used for Medicaid providers' and as the ADH Home Health Agency fee; it was not confirmed as the Private Care Agency fee in primary rule text. |
| Renewal | Private care agency licenses are annual on a calendar-year basis expiring December 31 (20 CAR § 49-105); renewal fee amount not published in the rule text retrieved. Separate benchmark: ADH's license application instructions set the Home Health Agency licensure fee at $1,000 per parent agency (plus $100 per subunit in Ark. Code § 20-10-812 summaries). |
| Surety bond | No state bond minimum found in the published rules |
| Liability insurance | $1,000,000 liability insurance minimum set by statute: a private care agency must retain liability insurance of not less than $1,000,000 to cover its employees and independent contractors while they are providing personal and attendant care services (Ark. Code § 20-10-2302 definition of 'private care agency'). |
| Timeline | State does not publish a processing time. Rules require a review and/or inspection before the license is issued, and periodic inspections no less than every three years after licensure (20 CAR § 49-106). |
| Administrator | The agency must have an organized governing board (at least one member, who may be the owner) that appoints an administrator and approves a plan for an alternate in the administrator's absence. The administrator manages daily functions, ensures staff are qualified and receive ongoing education, oversees budgeting/accounting, quality assurance and infection control, and reviews policies annually (20 CAR § 49-109). No education/experience minimum for the administrator was stated in the rule text retrieved. |
| State extras | $1,000,000 liability insurance premium (statutory); national and state criminal background checks and Child Maltreatment / Adult Maltreatment / CNA registry checks for all owners, principals, employees and contract staff, repeated at least every five years (Medicaid personal care participation rules); drug screening on hiring for Medicaid providers. |
| 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 | Home health license + a gate (see below) |
'Personal care services' in the rules means assistance with activities of daily living, hygiene and grooming; the Medicaid personal care vocabulary adds bathing, bladder/bowel, dressing, eating, incidental housekeeping, laundry, personal hygiene, shopping for personal maintenance items, medication assistance and mobility/ambulation. The private care agency definition is tied to furnishing in-home staffing for personal and attendant care 'for which the provider seeks reimbursement through the Arkansas Medicaid Program' — see verifiedNote on the private-pay gap. Live-in (the subchapter's purpose section contemplates 24-hour/7-day in-home personal care for eligible recipients) and standalone transport are not separate licensed categories in the text retrieved.
Skilled care is the separate Home Health Agency license from ADH Health Facility Services (Class A = skilled + personal care; Class B = personal care only, per Arkansas Medicaid personal care rules 200.110-200.120), $1,000 per parent agency in ADH application instructions. Gate: new home health agencies in Arkansas have historically required a Permit of Approval (Arkansas's CON-equivalent) from the Health Services Permit Agency before licensure — the ADH desk-review/survey sequence described in secondary summaries begins only 'once you have the POA in hand.' Verify current POA status with the Permit Agency at launch; the POA step was not re-verified in ADH primary text in this pass.
Skilled lane gate: a Permit of Approval (CON-equivalent) from the Arkansas Health Services Permit Agency has been required before a new home health agency license; not re-verified in primary text this pass — confirm before launch.
2025 legislation rewrote the private care agency scheme: Act 853 removed DHS DPSQA certification from licensure, Act 643 exempted previously trained home caregivers from repeating training, and Act 674 changed criminal-history check rules; ADH's amended Rules for Private Care Agencies (20 CAR Part 49) were proposed with an October 1, 2026 effective date. Separately, 2025 SB 120 proposed extending licensure, training and background checks to purely private-pay home care agencies, after testimony that the existing standards applied only to Medicaid-accepting agencies — the private-pay reach of the license was actively contested in 2025.
A private care agency applying to enroll as a Medicaid personal care provider must be licensed by ADH and must be enrolled in the Arkansas Medicaid ARChoices program (Personal Care provider manual § 200.130); Class A and Class B home health agencies may also provide Medicaid personal care. 2025 Act 853 removed the former DHS Division of Provider Services and Quality Assurance certification layer from private care agency licensure, leaving ADH licensure as the state gate.
EVV is required for Medicaid personal care services under the federal 21st Century Cures Act as implemented by Arkansas Medicaid.
The state fee above is one line of the real total. Run the true-cost calculator with Arkansas 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
