How long do CPE courses take? Are they difficult?

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  • #194696
    TheGuyCPA
    Participant

    Would I be able to fulfill all 120 hours in 2 weeks?

    FAR - 80
    REG - 78
    AUD - 88
    BEC - 84

    State of Illinois Licensed CPA as of September 2015

Viewing 6 replies - 1 through 6 (of 6 total)
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  • #671553
    taxgeek83
    Participant

    By my understanding, 120 hours of CPE generally means 120 hours of instruction – whether it be self-study, webinar or live classes. If you can pull that off in two weeks, more power to you! Guessing you're up against a deadline?

    #671554
    GotCPA
    Participant

    do you mean 120 credits? CPE is measured by credits you need to acquire not hours.

    with that said most 8 hr CPEs give you 8 credits. So to get 120 credits you would need to take 15 8credit courses, which is very unrealistic in 2 weeks, which is practically everday

    #671555
    Missy
    Participant

    1 CPE credit is supposed to equal 1 hour but I've knocked out 40 cpe credits in a day when in a pinch. If you find topics that you're already familiar with (anything with excel that is CPE eligible is an easy 3-4 credits in 20 min.)

    There are authorized CPE providers (cpethink.com or cpedepot.com) that you can buy courses or unlimited testing and a lot of these I just take the test without reading the text because I am already familiar., or you can even earn CPE credits for doing the Quickbooks ProAdvisor training at home. I think that is about 70 credits and took me a week.

    HOWEVER, some states say you have to do x hours per year and you can't cram them.

    Licensed Massachusetts Non Reporting CPA since 2012
    Finance/Admin/HR Manager

    #671556
    Anonymous
    Inactive

    I highly recommend the online CPE resources for those on a timeline. When I was an RTRP, you had to do x many credits and I used online services that counted for CPA credits too (haven't actually done my CPA CPE yet) – they were much quicker, easier, and more convenient. As others have said, theoretically it should take you 1 hour to do 1 credit, but like mla said, if you find something you're comfortable with, you can get through it MUCH quicker. APlusCPE was the CPE company that I used as an RTRP, but I don't think they have the best prices for the amount of CPE you need for CPA stuff. I'm going to find one of the unlimited companies later this year, get a year-long subscription, and use about 6 months this year to do my 2014 & 2015 CPE, then use the next 6 months to do my 2016 & 2017 CPE, and in that way get 4 years of CPE for 1 low price…and the convenience of doing it at home. 🙂

    #1590741
    jncpe
    Participant

    The NASBA standard, which is followed in most states, is 50 hours of study equals 1 CPE hour. With most online CPE providers, you take an exam based on an online pdf book. Depending on how familiar you are with the material, the actual time to pass the exam and receive a certificate is less than the standard. There are many good online CPE providers with similar courses and pricing. I work for JNCPE.com and have found that users on our site take less that 1 hour to complete each CPE credit. Someone mentioned unlimited CPE subscriptions, and the nice thing about them is that you have a variety of courses to choose from. If you start a course and find that it is taking too long, or is not interesting, you can try another course for no more money.

    #1590756
    Recked
    Participant

    Gleim offers online CPE, i think they even offer you one trial class for free.

    Live classes are 50 minutes = 1 hour.
    The self-study courses are rated for how long it would take the average user to complete the assigned reading and tasks.
    Downloadable .pdf documents and Ctrl+F = quick source material review for exam questions.

Viewing 6 replies - 1 through 6 (of 6 total)
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