2023 South Carolina Code of Laws › Title 40 - Professions and Occupations › Chapter 2 - Accountants › Section 40-2-250. Renewal of licenses; reinstatement of lapsed licenses.

(A) A licensee desiring to renew his license shall file an application for renewal on or before the renewal due date of the following year.
(B) The application for renewal of a license must include:
(1) current information concerning practice status;
(2) an accounting professional education report in a form acceptable to the board and subject to audit at the discretion of the board;
(3) an acknowledgment of the licensee's responsibility to substantiate and maintain records to support his continuing professional education report; and
(4) a renewal fee, if any.
(C) A licensee shall document forty hours of continuing professional education that is acceptable to the board, completed during the immediately preceding calendar year.
(1) Hour limitations in specific topics or subjects may be determined by the board.
(2) The board may by regulation provide for the carryover of excess hours of continuing professional education, and such carryover may be applied as if completed during the immediately preceding calendar year.
(3) A licensee is not required to report continuing professional education for the year in which the initial license was obtained.
(4) No carryover is allowed from a year in which continuing professional education was not required.
(5) The board may review, approve, and test any content or delivery type of continuing professional education.
(6) An annual ethics requirement must be met and included in the documented hours of continuing professional education. No less than two hours of the annual forty hours of continuing professional education must relate to ethics.
(D) All licensees who have not filed an application for renewal by the renewal date must be given notice, prior to the renewal lapse date, that an application for renewal has not been received.
(E) If a licensee does not file an application for renewal on or before the renewal due date, then the license is considered late. If a licensee does not file an application for renewal on or before the renewal lapse date, then the license is considered lapsed. Continued practice with a lapsed license may be sanctioned as the unlicensed practice of accounting.
(F) Renewal applications filed or completed after the renewal lapse date are subject to a reinstatement fee in the amount of five hundred dollars.
(G) A certified public accountant, accounting practitioner, or public accountant whose license has lapsed or has been inactive for:
(1) fewer than three years, the license may be reinstated by applying to the board, submitting proof of completing forty continuing professional education units for each year the license has lapsed or has been inactive, and paying the reinstatement fee;
(2) three or more years, the license may be reinstated upon completion of six months of additional experience, and one hundred twenty hours of continuing professional education;
(3) an indefinite period and has active status outside of this State may reinstate the license by submitting an application under Section 40-2-240.
HISTORY: 1996 Act No. 453, Section 1; 2004 Act No. 289, Section 1; 2014 Act No. 268 (H.3459), Section 5, eff June 9, 2014; 2015 Act No. 51 (S.301), Section 7, eff June 3, 2015; 2022 Act No. 174 (S.812), Section 1, eff May 16, 2022.
Effect of Amendment
2014 Act No. 268, Section 5, in subsection (F), inserted ", accounting practitioner,".
2015 Act No. 51, Section 7, rewrote the section.
2022 Act No. 174, Section 1, rewrote the section.