There was a jump in the number of people who wrote the Life Licence Qualification Program (LLQP) exam late last year as candidates rushed to sit the test before the new, harmonized version of the program was introduced. The rules governing exam re-writes have also changed.
On March 29, the Canadian Insurance Services Regulatory Organizations (CISRO) published an update on the new, harmonized LLQP which came into effect across Canada at the beginning of the year. They note that there was a significant increase in demand for LLQP exam sittings in late 2015. "In some jurisdictions, the number of exam sittings arranged in November/December was nearly 350% of the number for the same period in 2014," reads the update.
Harmonized LLQP
For those who were not able to finish the old version of the LLQP by the end of last year, the regulators point out that they can still complete a qualifying program based on the harmonized LLQP in order to write the new exam.
When the harmonized LLQP was introduced, most jurisdictions also revised their exam rewrite policies. While candidates should confirm the rewrite policy of their home regulator, in general CISRO says the following rules now apply to exam rewrites:
- A candidate may attempt each module up to five times in one year.
- After the third unsuccessful attempt, a candidate must wait three months between each additional attempt at that module.
- After five attempts, the waiting period is six months for each additional rewrite of that module.
"Candidates writing in Alberta are subject to the rewrite policy that was in place prior to January 2016, pending changes to regulation," reads the statement from CISRO. "Please contact the Alberta Insurance Council for information on exam waiting periods in that province."
CISRO also warns that exams written in any jurisdiction count towards a candidate’s total number of attempts, which means that they cannot avoid the waiting period by writing the exam in another jurisdiction.
