Report Your Experience
Get ahead of the game. You can report your experience at any time through the online experience reporting profile available in your CFP Board Account Dashboard. You will be able to review previously submitted entries, update hours for your current position and enter new experience.
How to Report Your Experience
Your experience can be reported to CFP Board at any time through the experience reporting feature in your CFP Board Account Dashboard. We encourage you to report early and update often to keep your profile current. If you have already reported experience, you can also use your Account Dashboard to review past entries and confirm or update your remaining hours balance.
There are 2 main pathways to completing the experience requirement. Review them today.
Completing Your Experience Profile
We will accept experience completed within 10 years before and 5 years after successful completion of the CFP® exam. Once your experience requirement is completed, your account will show a “Provisionally Accepted” status until final CFP® exam results are released verifying you successfully passed the exam. At that time, the “Provisionally Accepted” status will change to “Accepted.” Some helpful tips are below.
Refresh Hours
Current experience (with no end date) entered in your Experience Profile can be refreshed at any time. The Refresh Hours function recalculates hours from the date entered to the current date.
Experience Entered
You will enter experience or refresh hours for your position until you meet the required number of hours. You should assume that the experience you entered is provisionally accepted, unless otherwise noted. Some experience types will be automatically reviewed and/or verification requested.
Experience Submitted
Once you meet the required number of hours, you will need to submit your entered experience by clicking the “Submit” button that will appear. Once submitted, each experience entry will have an updated status of Accepted, Pending Verification, or Provisionally Accepted.
Experience Statuses Terminology
Below is some helpful terminology related to the status of experience that has been entered and submitted.
ENTERED
Your experience entries will have a status of Entered any time you add an experience entry, allowing you to Edit or Refresh hours until you reach the required number of hours. Unless otherwise noted, you should assume this experience is accepted.
ACCEPTED
Once you meet the required number of hours and click the “Submit” button, your entries will change to “Accepted,” unless otherwise noted. If you have not passed the CFP® exam when you click the “Submit” button, your entries will change to “Provisionally Accepted” pending successful completion.
Pending Verification
Certain types of experience, including Apprenticeship, indirect support, self-employment, pro bono and volunteer experience, automatically require verification before the experience can be “Accepted” or “Provisionally Accepted.” Other experience may be randomly selected for verification before the experience can be “Accepted” or “Provisionally Accepted.”
Under Internal Review
Certain experience entries will trigger an automatic internal review. These reviews are typically completed within 3-5 business days, and you will be notified whether the experience is accepted, if more information is required or if experience has been denied.
Verification of Experience by CFP Board
The “Pending Verification” status means that we emailed an attestation request to the supervisor or qualified attester you identified with your job entry. The attestation includes verification of your position, start date, end date (if applicable), hours worked per week and the elements of the financial planning process that you used. Attestation requests are generated under these conditions:
- Apprenticeship Pathway: All Apprenticeship hours reported are subject to verification. After you complete the 4,000 hours and click the “Submit” button, we will email an attestation request to your supervising CFP® professional.
- Indirect Support, Self-employment, Pro bono or Volunteer Experience: All hours reported under these categories are subject to verification. Once these types of hours are entered, we will email an attestation request directly to the supervisor or qualified attester you identified.
- Standard Pathway and Teaching: We may randomly select your entries for verification once you complete 6,000 hours and click the “Submit” button; if your profile is selected, we will email an attestation request directly to the supervisor you identified.
Verification Approved
The experience status on the verified entry will automatically change to “Provisionally Accepted” or “Accepted.”
Verification Not Received
CFP Board will reach out to your supervisor or qualified attester directly with a follow-up request. After 10 business days, if the attestation has still not been received, you will be notified with next steps (determined on a case-by-case basis).
Verification Withheld
There may be occasions when the supervisor or qualified attester does not feel comfortable completing the attestation request. CFP Board will first reach out to your supervisor or qualified attester when we receive the notice that they do not want to provide verification, and then follow up with you to discuss next steps (determined on a case-by-case basis).
Are you ready to report your experience?
We encourage you to report your experience and monitor your status. Log in to your CFP Board Account Dashboard and use the experience reporting feature.
Start your journey to CFP® Certification
- Track your progress with the CFP® Certification Tracker
- Post your resume at the Career Center
- Connect with a mentor who can guide you
- Register and prepare for the exam
- Find career and financial support
- Connect with other candidates at our online forum