[Anonymous]

Hi everyone,

I am applying for initial licensing in OR at the end of this April. I have the 150 education requirements and I work in an audit firm.

However, after passing the AICPA Comprehensive Ethic Course, it states that all AICPA licensed members are required to complete 120 CPE credits once every 3 years in order to renew their license.

I checked online, each CPE course is like 4 credits, which means we have to take 10 CPE courses per year until the day we retire.

Hence, I am just wondering for those that already have a CPA license, how are the CPE courses like? Are the courses similar to University courses? Or it is a lot easier and less time consuming?

Jeff, any comments please? Because 120 CPE credits once every 3 years until retirement is actually quite intimidating to me.

Thank you for all the help.

[Noct]

CPE is totally different from college classes.

First off, they are counted by hours, not credits, so a 4 hour class is worth 4 hours.

Second, there are no tests. You just have to be there. However, some courses offer voluntary tests which grant extra hours.

Finally, the classes consist of other professionals, so there's less goofing off and stupid questions.

It's not as bad as it sounds.

FAR - 79 - 07/2012
AUD - 65, 78 - 11/2012
BEC - 76 - 11/2012
REG - 78 - 01/2013
ETH - 98 - 01/2013

Material: Wiley books

[jelly]

CPE can be different formats, i.e. paper and pencil, online videos or presentations, all-day conferences, etc. The independent paper and pencil ones tend to have quizzes, while it can be a mix with online videos, and all-day conferences are about showing up, signing in and filling out a survey at the end. Some of these formats can be cheap, or can get relatively expensive.

120 every three years is pretty much 40 per year, which is very typical for many states (Definitely check to see if Oregon requires state specific ethic CPEs in that three year period). It's usually considered 1 CPE = 50 minutes.

You can get 8 CPEs in one shot by going to an all-day conference, if your company will pay for you (these also tend to be places where networking goes on). If your company is relatively large in size, they may develop their own CPE, which is usually watching videos or live instruction for a few hours or days at a designated time. If you feel like being adventurous, the Big4 also have free CPE sessions every week through online presentations and it is only poll surveying that is done through the presentation. Their topics tend to be very interesting and timely to what is going on in the accounting and tax world.

Couldn't pass again!

[Author]

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