AICPA membership renewal is due on or before July 31 each year. The process runs through your online account: confirm your membership type and tier, verify your profile, attest that you meet continuing professional education (CPE) requirements, add any section memberships you want, and pay your dues. Ten minutes if your records are in order. Longer if they aren’t.
The membership year runs August 1 through July 31, and the first renewal notice goes out by email in June.1AICPA & CIMA. How to Renew Your AICPA Membership
How to Renew Step by Step
Log into your account on the AICPA & CIMA website and start with your profile. Check your contact details, employment status, and state CPA license status. Stale information here can cause problems with your CPE attestation or your eligibility for the tier you’re selecting.
Next, confirm your membership type. The AICPA recognizes three:
- Regular Member, for anyone who holds or once held a valid CPA certificate issued by a state authority. Regular members have full voting rights.
- Affiliate Member, for accounting or finance professionals who are not licensed CPAs, including people who passed the CPA Exam but have not met the experience requirements for licensure.
- International Associate, for accounting or finance professionals who belong to an approved partner organization outside the United States.
Regular members then choose a tier. Staff-level members pick from Core, Essential, Lead, or Specialist. Partner-level members pick from Core, Specialist, or Advance. Higher tiers bundle in more CPE credits and learning resources. Annual dues range roughly from $180 at the low end to $999 at the top.2AICPA & CIMA. AICPA Types and Tiers If you joined mid-year, your initial dues were prorated, and anyone who joined in May, June, or July had that payment applied to the upcoming membership year.1AICPA & CIMA. How to Renew Your AICPA Membership
During renewal you can add specialized section memberships in areas such as Tax, Personal Financial Planning, Forensic and Valuation Services, or Not-for-Profit. Each carries a separate fee on top of your base dues.3AICPA & CIMA. Section Membership
Then you attest to CPE compliance. This is a formal attestation, not a checkbox to click through. Finally, pay. The AICPA takes credit cards and eCheck online, and you can also renew by phone or mail a personal check with the remittance form.
If you would rather not track the deadline each year, turn on auto-renewal in your account under Profile, then “My Purchases,” then “My membership and benefits.” You need a credit card saved to your online wallet, and the AICPA will send a reminder about a month before your renewal date.4AICPA & CIMA. How to Renew Your AICPA Membership Auto-renewal handles the payment. Your CPE is still your problem.
The CPE Requirement That Trips People Up
Regular members must complete 120 hours of CPE, or its equivalent, over each three-year reporting period. That period starts on January 1 of the first calendar year after you joined or upgraded to Regular membership.5AICPA & CIMA. AICPA Membership CPE Requirements The three-year cycle does not align with the annual dues deadline, which is where confusion starts.
There is no minimum in any single year. You could technically finish all 120 hours in year three. Content does not need to fall within specific subject areas, as long as it contributes to your professional competence.
You get a two-month grace period after the end of each cycle to make up a shortfall, but hours completed during that grace window cannot count toward the next reporting period.5AICPA & CIMA. AICPA Membership CPE Requirements If your cycle ended December 31 and you scramble through 15 hours in January, those hours are gone from the next cycle’s bank.
You don’t submit CPE records at renewal. You attest, and the AICPA reserves the right to audit. Your records for each program should include the sponsor’s name, a title and description of the content, the dates and location, and the number of contact hours earned.5AICPA & CIMA. AICPA Membership CPE Requirements Keep them for the whole reporting period. If your documentation falls apart in an audit, the consequences are the same as never doing the hours: potential suspension or termination.
Who Is Exempt
Retired members, unemployed members, and those who have temporarily left the workforce are exempt from AICPA CPE. So are members who have placed their CPA license on inactive status with their state board and do not hold themselves out as CPAs, provided the state board does not require CPE while on inactive status.6AICPA & CIMA. AICPA Membership Requirements
An AICPA exemption is not a state exemption. Your AICPA membership and your state CPA license are separate obligations, governed by separate organizations, with separate CPE and fee rules. If you’re keeping an active license, you still meet whatever your state requires.
What Happens If You Miss July 31
Your membership doesn’t disappear the next morning. The AICPA will send a notice telling you when your benefits will lapse and when your membership will be canceled if payment still hasn’t arrived. Unpaid accounts may also be assessed a $30 late fee.1AICPA & CIMA. How to Renew Your AICPA Membership
Once membership is formally canceled, coming back is harder than paying overdue dues. The rejoin process may require you to reapply and show you still meet eligibility requirements, including CPE compliance for the period when you were lapsed. That paperwork alone is reason enough to pay on time or set up auto-renewal.
Retired, TLW, and Inactive Status
If your working life has changed, you can renew under a reduced-obligation category.
Retired status is open to Regular members who have reached full retirement age as defined by the Social Security Administration and, if still working, average fewer than 20 hours per week calculated annually.7AICPA & CIMA. Maintain Your Membership Beyond Your Professional Career Retired members are exempt from AICPA CPE and pay reduced dues.6AICPA & CIMA. AICPA Membership Requirements
The Temporarily Left the Workforce (TLW) designation is available to Regular members who are temporarily unemployed, on early retirement before full retirement age, on medical or family leave, or serving as a carer. To select it, choose the Regular membership type at renewal, then pick “I have temporarily left the workforce” from the employment dropdown and select the reason that applies.1AICPA & CIMA. How to Renew Your AICPA Membership TLW members are exempt from AICPA CPE.6AICPA & CIMA. AICPA Membership Requirements
Both statuses must be confirmed at each annual renewal. If you go back to active practice, update your status and resume the standard CPE and dues obligations.
Peer Review If You’re in Public Practice
This one catches people at renewal. If you’re in public practice in the United States and you or your firm perform services that fall within the scope of the AICPA’s practice-monitoring standards, most accounting and auditing work, your firm must be enrolled in the AICPA Peer Review Program. If the firm isn’t eligible to enroll, you enroll individually.6AICPA & CIMA. AICPA Membership Requirements
This is a membership requirement. Firms can be terminated from the program for refusing to cooperate with peer review, failing to correct deficiencies after repeated corrective actions, or failing to receive a passing rating after consecutive reviews. Missing a peer review report filing deadline or failing to complete required corrective actions counts as non-cooperation.8AICPA. AICPA Peer Review Board Rules of Procedures for the Termination of a Firm If your firm’s enrollment is terminated, that creates a personal membership eligibility problem for you. Check that peer review is current before you click renew.
Renewing AICPA Specialty Credentials
If you hold specialty credentials, each carries its own annual fee and recertification demands on top of your base membership. The CPE hours are separate from the general 120-hour requirement, which is what makes them easy to miss:
- ABV (Accredited in Business Valuation): 60 hours of continuing professional development within the ABV body of knowledge every three years, with a minimum of 10 hours in each year, plus four hours of professional ethics every three years. Credential renewal happens in July, and requirements must be met in the calendar year before renewal.9AICPA & CIMA. AICPA Credential Recertification Requirements
- CFF (Certified in Financial Forensics): 20 hours of CPD related to the CFF body of knowledge each year.9AICPA & CIMA. AICPA Credential Recertification Requirements
- CITP (Certified Information Technology Professional): 20 hours of CPD within the CITP body of knowledge each year, and up to half can come from unstructured learning.9AICPA & CIMA. AICPA Credential Recertification Requirements
- PFS (Personal Financial Specialist): 20 hours of CPD each year, with up to half from unstructured learning.9AICPA & CIMA. AICPA Credential Recertification Requirements
- CVFI (Certified in Valuation of Financial Instruments): eight hours of CPD on financial instruments topics each year, plus 1,500 hours of relevant experience every five years.9AICPA & CIMA. AICPA Credential Recertification Requirements
Every credential also requires you to keep AICPA membership in good standing and hold a valid, unrevoked CPA certificate. If your base membership lapses, your credentials lapse with it, and getting them back may mean meeting the original application requirements all over again.