IL talent agency bonds.
From $100. Enter your amount.
A talent agency that wants to sign union performers in Illinois has to be franchised by SAG-AFTRA, and the franchise is conditioned on a surety bond running to the union. It sits on top of the bond the State already takes for your agency licence, because it protects a different party: the performer whose earnings pass through your trust account. Premiums cost 1% of the bond amount, $100 minimum; the application collects no credit information, and most applications approve instantly.
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Apply to filed in one sitting.
The union side of an agency file moves quickly once the bond exists — it is the state licence, not the surety, that sets the pace. Here is the whole thing:
Apply online
Your agency details, your county, the bond amount the franchise requires, and an effective date. No financial statements, no credit section.
Pay & e-sign
Talent agency bonds are among the thousands of bond types that issue right after purchase. The application collects no credit information, and most applications approve instantly.
Send it to SAG-AFTRA
Your executed bond and power of attorney arrive by email, ready to submit with your franchise application or renewal. Wet-ink original mailed on request.
What it is and who needs it.
What the SAG-AFTRA agency bond actually guarantees
A franchised agency stands between a performer and a producer, and money moves through it in both directions — a session payment lands with the agency, the agency takes its commission and passes the balance on. SAG-AFTRA, as the union whose members are on the other end of that transfer, requires a franchised agency to post a bond so that a member harmed by an agency’s misconduct has a real recovery and not just a grievance.
The obligee is the union, not the State of Illinois. A claim looks like commissions taken above the franchise limits, funds held past the deadline or never passed on, or a breach of the franchise agreement’s conduct rules. Coverage commonly targets $20,000 in total: in states that already require a talent-agency bond, the union bond is written to complement the state bond up to that figure rather than to duplicate it, which is why the amount on your paperwork may not be a round $20,000.
Illinois is one of those states. Agencies that procure engagements for performers are licensed here by the Illinois Department of Labor under the Private Employment Agency Act (225 ILCS 515), which takes a $5,000 bond filed with the licence application and conditioned on the licensee conforming to the Act — and an aggrieved employer, employee or other person may sue on it in circuit court. Two bonds, two obligees, two purposes. Neither is insurance for you — if a surety pays a claim, you reimburse the surety.
You need this bond if you are
One application, issued instantly.
These are the actual issuing fields — no credit section, because this application does not collect credit information.
Start the application →Common questions.
Other Illinois bonds.
Get the franchise filed.
From $100, no credit section, bond issued the moment you pay. Enter the amount your franchise names. Free until issued.