CPA Licensure - BEWARE

[eyrobinson]

I'm in the process of applying to take the CPA exam in New Hampshire. My application is being held up due to all the non-traditional credits on my transcript. I have credits from Straighterline, Penn Foster, CLEP, DANTES, TECEPs, ALEKS, and Pearson. It does say they accept credit from CLEP and DANTES so I figured all my other non-traditional credits would be fine. They are trying to say my ACE credits were earned from work experience and not through courses! The horrible part is I had to call to get that information. I did not receive an email or phone call informing me of the problem. As of right now, the New Hampshire Board is trying to figure out if they want to accept my credits or not. The CPA boards need to get with the program and understand there are numerous ways to gain credit and not just from an accredited college. Sigh, I'm praying this turns out well. I will keep everyone posted...

[sanantone]

You can tell them that ACE is the same organization that recommends CLEP, AP, and DSST exams for credit.

[frances]

Though I have no interest in applying for the CPA exam in New Hampshire, I am interested in the outcome of your case, eyrobinson. Please keep us posted.

[sirjake]

Wow. I worried about this, as I had been planning to pursue CPA licensure, but ended up getting recruited into engineering instead. This had always been a niggling worry in the back of my mind. How many credits would you be shy? And are they credits in the "required' accounting/business category or just ones that make up your total requirement (usually 150)? Given your status as an MS student, I suspect the latter....

[sirjake]

Reading their posted requirements, I find it remarkable that they're giving you grief over this:

Correspondence, online courses and CLEP credit are acceptable when you receive credit for the courses at a regionally accredited university. These courses must appear on an official transcript. (Source: New Hampshire | NASBA and here: http://www.nasba.org/files/2011/02/Info_...pshire.pdf)

Isn't that precisely what those ACE credits would be? And sheesh, you're going for the MS, so it's not like you're trying to weasel in or something. This is absolutely baffling to me. If they turned me down because of 3 or 9 credits I could "replace" with CLEP or something else relatively easily, I might just do that, but if it's a bunch, I might do my best to appeal/fight this.

[eyrobinson]

Exactly sirjake! I wrote the state coordinator today to get a clearer understanding. The main issue is how Excelsior applies credits below the degree line (I don't know if there are other issues). I have a lot of credits from Straighterline that are not applied to my degree and of course the only way to get credit for them was to send them to Excelsior. Those credits are not part of my bachelor's degree.

New Hampshire does not currently require 150 credits, so I don't know if that could be an issue in the future. On July 1st that changes though and they will also require 30 accounting credits instead of the current 12.

I have no idea what I would be short in. I know I fulfill the 12 credit requirement, but 6 of those credits are from Straighterline (Accounting I & II) and 3 from TECEP (Individual Taxation). The other 3 credits are from my Master's program. I'll have 6 more credits by the end of the month, so I'll just send those in too when I get them. I sent the state coordinator the Excelsior policy. I'll see what happens tomorrow.

[cannoda]

. My application is being held up due to all the non-traditional credits on my transcript. I have credits from Straighterline, Penn Foster, CLEP, DANTES, TECEPs, ALEKS, and Pearson. . .They are trying to say my ACE credits were earned from work experience and not through courses! The horrible part is I had to call to get that information.

I suspect that they simply are unaware of what is required to earn credit for Straighterline, Pearson, ALEKS, etc. Is it the NH Accountancy Board that is questioning the credit, or NASBA? I've seen NASBA do strange things - approve individuals to take the exam that are clearly missing a required course, or holding up an application for clarification on something any accounting professor would recognize as valid on sight. From what I've seen, the people doing the evaluation are at the level of a clerk, and are not necessarily knowledgeable about ACE and other forms of non-traditional credit except for CLEP and DANTES which have been around for decades. They've probably been burned in the past with "credit for life experience" or something along those lines. This will probably be resolved in your favor.

[Vonne]

Best regards with resolving this. Some licensing/accrediting boards are quite adverse to non traditional qualifiers.

[sirjake]

I have to wonder if it's the fact that they aren't part of your degree. I can see them making the case that they aren't really counting as college credit in that case. That would suck, but I can see their point. It might be the case that in order to get them recognized you would have to enroll in a degree program where they would count. I.e., even if you have zero intention of graduating, if you're "in progress" and they're on your transcript for an AS in Accounting (or whatever), that would possibly work. Obviously, that's potentially expensive (at least at the big three), so you would want to verify that that would work first. If I were you, I would at least research to see if that would work and see if one of the colleges that Straighterline partners with has a low entrance fee and a program where the credits would apply.

Are the 6 Straighterline accounting credits part of the "below the line" credits at Excelsior?

As to the 150 credit thing: that should not bite you in NH as you would be grandfathered if you were already a CPA, but it might in other states. I.e., if a state currently requires 150 and you get your CPA with only 120, I'm pretty sure a few of them are sticklers about it if you want to transfer. Reciprocity works on a lot of things, but not always. At least when I was looking into it that was the way I read it. Regardless, your MS would likely fill up those requirements almost everywhere, as those credits often count as 1.5 undergraduate credits.

[eyrobinson]

Yes, the 6 Straighterline accounting credits are below the line and yes it is NASBA giving me problems. My file was referred to the "Director" so hopefully he has more experience with ACE credits.

Oh yes and I totally understand the reciprocity issue with the "lower" standards compared to other states. And nope no grandfathering in if you don't have your CPA license by July 1st. You have to fulfill all the new requirements after that date. "If your license has not been issued by July 1, 2014, you will be required to meet the new eligibility requirements to be licensed regardless of when you first applied for the examination."