North Carolina CPA License

North Carolina CPA License

Here is a step-by-step guide to help you to get a CPA license in North Carolina.

Step 1. Complete Your Education

  1. Find and contact the institutions in North Carolina that offer accounting programs, in order to get detailed information. All the certified accountants must meet the educational criteria of the North Carolina State Board of CPA Examiners. It includes a bachelor’s degree consisting of at least 150 semester hours of college credit and a bachelor’s degree.
  2. Also, make sure that the program which you are planning to take is acceptable to the North Carolina State Board of CPA Examiners.
  3. Take the courses that the North Carolina State Board of CPA Examiners can accept as a credit.
    1. You need to have 150 semester hours and a bachelor’s degree and take accounting concentrations.
    2. Additional to the accounting concentration, you have to take classwork for 24 semester hours.

Step 2. Pass The Uniform CPA Exam

According to North Carolina Law, you must meet the following requirements to be able to take the Uniform CPA Exam։

  • Have citizenship of the United States.
  • Be a permanent resident alien or a citizen of a foreign country with equal inspection rights.
  • Be at least 18 years or older
  • Have a good moral character.
  • Meet the education requirements.
  1. Complete the Initial Application for Uniform CPA Exam.
  2. With your application, you also need to provide the following documents:
    1. Two passport-sized photos of you
    2. Original transcripts from the college with the seal
    3. If you didn’t complete the accounting concentration, list the schools, classes, semester hours, and estimated date for completing the accounting concentration.
    4. Application fee and the administrative fee of $230 plus fees for each part of the exam which you want to take
    5. Three references of your moral character
    6. Any court papers pertaining to pending and past charges
  3. When your application is approved you will get the Notice to Schedule (NTS) the Uniform CPA Exam. You will get it by mail, fax, or email.
  4. In order to make an appointment for the exam in North Carolina visit the Prometric testing center website.The result of the exam you will receive during every testing window. Also, before getting the notification from the board, you can find them online.
  5. So, the next step is to come to the testing center and take the exam.After the NASBA receives the scores from the AICPA, you have 2 days in order to get the result using the North Carolina page of the NASBA Gateway. Also the board public scores on Facebook and Twitter.

Don’t worry you will get the paper with your scores. But it is not available immediately, so you need to wait a little bit longer.

In order to get more information about the exam click here.

Step 3. Get The Necessary Experience.

Additionally, you are required you complete the necessary experience in order to be able to get the license։

  1. Find the institution that will help you to satisfy the experience requirements. There are seveeral option that you can do.
    1. For a year work with a certificated CPA in the public practice of accounting or the practice of accounting.
    2. Get four years of experience teaching accounting at an accredited university or college.
    3. Fulfill four years of accounting practice as a sole proprietor.
    4. Get four years of accounting experience without the licensed CPA.
    5. Complete the equal combination of the listed above options.
  2. Complete the right Experience Affidavit for each option.

Fill in the form, ask your supervisor to complete and sign it. After submitting the form with your license application.

Step 4. Get Your North Carolina CPA License.

Once you have met all the requirements, you are ready to apply for North Carolina CPA license.

  1. You are also required to take the open-book exam on the North Carolina Accountancy Statutes and Rules. In order to meet this requirement before applying for the license, you must have 8 hours of CPE.
  2. Double-check the requirements to make sure that you have met all of them.
  3. Apply for your North Carolina CPA Certificate.
    1. Submit the Original North Carolina CPA Certificate Application and all the necessary documents.Provide the following.
      1. A passport-sized photo of you
      2. The North Carolina Accountancy Statutes and Rules course certificate
      3. $100 application fee
      4. 3 signed forms about your moral character from CPAs attesting
      5. The completed, signed, notarized Experience Affidavits
      6. The 150 Semester Hour Worksheet
  4. When your application will be approved you will get a CPA Certificate

Step 5. Stay Current Through Continuing Professional Education in North Carolina

In order to keep your CPA certificate in North Carolina, you need to meet the state’s continuing professional education (CPE) requirements.

  • Take 40 CPE hours each year.
  • Select program from CPE from NASBA’s National Registry of CPE Sponsors
  • Keep all the documents and certificates that you will get
  • Report your CPE hours every year at the certificate renewal time.
Karine H

Karine H

Karine is a newcomer in the content writing field. She is studying biomedical engineering at NPUA, previously she studied marketing at LPFA. Also, she takes part in different engineering projects and competitions like USWC 21 - Venture Cup. She started content writing a year ago and since then wrote about 100 articles for various websites. Karine has done various volunteering work, business meetings, etc. According to Karine, all the volunteer jobs helped her improve her communication, team working, problem-solving skills, which nowadays helps her in content writing as she knows what people want to hear, and what information they need. This is just the beginning and everything just stats for this girl.