Pennsylvania Life & Health Insurance Exam — Study Guide

How to use this chapter. Everything before this point is national content. This chapter is the other half of your exam: the Pennsylvania-specific portion, drawn from Title 40 of the Pennsylvania Statutes (Purdon's, cited "40 P.S.") — principally the Insurance Department Act of 1921, the Insurance Company Law of 1921, the Unfair Insurance Practices Act, and the Insurance Producer Licensing article added by Act 147 of 2002 — together with the Insurance Commissioner's regulations in Title 31 of the Pennsylvania Code. This is the half that repeat test-takers fail. It is finite and rule-based. Learn the structure first, then the numbers.

Vocabulary, and it is tested. Pennsylvania's regulator is the Pennsylvania Insurance Department, headed by the Insurance Commissioner. Pennsylvania does not use "Superintendent" or "Director." Since Act 147 of 2002 the licensed individual is an insurance producer — the older split between "agent" (represents the insurer) and "broker" (represents the applicant) was consolidated into the single producer license. But many Title 31 regulations were written before 2002 and still say "agent or broker" — the replacement regulation in Chapter 81 is literally captioned "Duties of agents and brokers." Read those as applying to you, the producer.

A word about numbers. Pennsylvania's rules are stable; the numbers attached to them are not. Fees, credit hours, license terms, filing windows, penalty caps, free-look days, and guaranty caps are set by statute, regulation, or Department notice and are amended by the General Assembly and by rulemaking — Pennsylvania abolished its pre-licensing education requirement and rewrote its rebating law, both effective in 2025. So here is exactly what the figures below are worth. Most of them were read against the primary source on 2026-09-05 and now carry an inline citation — a statute section, a Pennsylvania Code section, or the Department's own published schedule — followed by the date the source was read. Treat a cited figure as good as of that date and no later. A small number of figures could not be confirmed from a primary or official source. Those still carry a bracketed verify-current flag, and each flag names the specific thing to ask the Pennsylvania Insurance Department. A flag is never about whether a rule exists — it exists, and is stated affirmatively — only about a number we will not assert without a source we actually read.

1. The Pennsylvania Insurance Department, the Commissioner, and enforcement

Pennsylvania regulates the business of insurance through the Pennsylvania Insurance Department, an administrative department of the Commonwealth created and empowered by the Insurance Department Act of 1921 (40 P.S. § 1 et seq.) and the Administrative Code. Its chief officer is the Insurance Commissioner, appointed by the Governor with the advice and consent of the Senate. The Department's headquarters is in Harrisburg (1209 Strawberry Square), and it operates a toll-free Consumer Services line and an online complaint system.

General powers. The Commissioner licenses and regulates insurers, producers, and other insurance entities; approves policy forms and, for the rate-regulated lines, rates; conducts financial and market-conduct examinations; investigates complaints; holds administrative hearings; issues orders including cease-and-desist orders; imposes civil penalties; and adopts regulations — the source of every Title 31 chapter cited in this chapter. The Commissioner also serves as statutory rehabilitator or liquidator of an impaired or insolvent Pennsylvania insurer under Article V of the Insurance Department Act (40 P.S. § 221.1 et seq.), which is the doorway to the guaranty association in Section 6. Formal adjudications run under Pennsylvania's Administrative Agency Law (2 Pa.C.S.), and a party aggrieved by a final Department adjudication may appeal to the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania.

Examinations. The Commissioner has statutory authority to examine the affairs, transactions, accounts, records, and assets of every insurer doing business in Pennsylvania, and to examine licensed producers and other regulated entities, under the Department's examination law (40 P.S. § 323.1 et seq.). The Commissioner may examine a company as often as he or she in sole discretion deems appropriate, but must examine every insurer licensed in Pennsylvania not less frequently than once every five years (40 P.S. §323.3(b); checked 2026-09-05). Learn the sequence, which is testable independent of any day count: examine → examiner's report → the examinee is given an opportunity to review and respond → the Commissioner adopts a final report by order → the report becomes a public document. The day counts are fixed by statute: the examiner in charge files a verified written report no later than 60 days following completion of the examination; the Department transmits it to the company with a reasonable opportunity of not more than 30 days to make a written submission or rebuttal; the Commissioner enters an order adopting, rejecting, or calling an investigatory hearing within 30 days of the end of that period; and after adoption the report is held private and confidential for 30 days before the Department may open it for public inspection (40 P.S. §323.5(b)–(e); checked 2026-09-05). Examiners may take testimony under oath and compel production of records; the Commissioner may accept another state's examination report for a foreign insurer. Obstructing or refusing an examination is itself a ground for administrative action.

Enforcement against producers. Under the licensing article, the Commissioner may refuse to issue, refuse to renew, suspend, or revoke a producer license, may impose a civil penalty, may issue cease-and-desist orders, and may impose other conditions on a license. The statutory civil penalty is up to $5,000 for each action in violation of the act (40 P.S. §310.91(d)(2); checked 2026-09-05). Separately, a licensee who fails to give the Department a written response within 30 days of receiving a written inquiry, or who fails to remit valid payment of fees due, must correct the violation within 15 days of the Department's notice; if the licensee does not, the Department may assess an administrative fine of no more than $100 per day per violation (40 P.S. §310.12; checked 2026-09-05). Surrendering or allowing a license to lapse does not extinguish the Commissioner's jurisdiction over conduct committed while licensed.

Fraud. Pennsylvania treats insurance fraud as a crime: 18 Pa.C.S. § 4117 defines the offense of insurance fraud, reaching a person who knowingly presents false, incomplete, or misleading information in connection with an application, a claim, or a rate filing, and reaching producers specifically — including a producer who knowingly benefits from the proceeds of insurance fraud. Section 4117 also requires the fraud warning notice that appears on Pennsylvania applications and claim forms ("Any person who knowingly and with intent to defraud … files an application … containing any materially false information … commits a fraudulent insurance act"). Pennsylvania funds anti-fraud work through the Insurance Fraud Prevention Authority (40 P.S. § 325.1 et seq.), and insurance fraud is prosecuted by the Office of Attorney General's Insurance Fraud Section and by county district attorneys. Good-faith reporting of suspected fraud is protected by statutory immunity. Producer takeaway: report suspected fraud through your insurer's SIU; never "help" an applicant word an answer.

2. Producer licensing

Who must be licensed

Pennsylvania law makes it unlawful for a person to sell, solicit, or negotiate insurance in the Commonwealth without a producer license (Insurance Department Act, Article VI-A, added by Act 147 of 2002; 40 P.S. § 310.1 et seq.). Memorize the three verbs: sell (exchange a contract of insurance on behalf of an insurer for money or other consideration), solicit (attempt to sell, or ask or urge a person to apply for, a particular kind of insurance from a particular insurer), and negotiate (confer directly with or offer advice directly to a purchaser or prospective purchaser about the substantive benefits, terms, or conditions of a contract).

The statute exempts, among others, officers and salaried employees of an insurer who do not sell, solicit, or negotiate and are not paid commissions, persons performing purely clerical or administrative functions, and employees of rating organizations. Separate or limited categories exist for business entity producers, limited lines producers, surplus lines licensees, fraternal benefit society representatives, viatical settlement brokers, and public adjusters.

Resident license requirements

1. Pre-examination education — abolished. Pennsylvania's producer licensing statute (Section 604-A) once required approved pre-examination coursework before an applicant could sit for the licensing exam. It no longer does. Recent change: Act 142 of 2024 deleted the requirement outright. In the current statute, subsection 604-A(b) reads "Preexamination education requirements.--((b) deleted by amendment Oct. 31, 2024, P.L.1155, No.142)", and the matching licensing criterion in Section 606-A(a)(3) — "The applicant has satisfied the preexamination education requirements of this act" — was deleted by the same act. Act 142 provides "This act shall take effect in 180 days" and was approved October 31, 2024, which puts the change in force on April 29, 2025 (Act of Oct. 31, 2024, P.L.1155, No.142; 40 P.S. §§310.4(b), 310.6(a)(3); checked 2026-09-05). Get the act number right: it is Act 142 of 2024, not Act 146. Two things survive the repeal and remain testable. The examination itself is still required, and the exemptions from the examination are still enumerated in Section 604-A(d): a business entity; a holder of the CLU (life or accident and health), CPCU (property, casualty or accident and health), or CIC (life, accident and health, or property and casualty) designation; any other designation the Commissioner waives; a person already licensed in another state for the lines sought under Section 606-A or 610-A; limited line credit insurance and other limited lines; certain domestic mutual fire applicants; and restricted fraternal (40 P.S. §310.4(d); checked 2026-09-05). Approved pre-licensing courses may still be offered under 31 Pa. Code Chapter 39a — they are simply no longer a condition of licensure.
2. Pass the Pennsylvania licensing examination for each line of authority. The Department's current vendor is PSI: the Department's own licensing page instructs candidates to "Visit the PID PSI site" at test-takers.psiexams.com/pain "or call 1-888-818-5822 to schedule the appropriate insurance examination" (Pennsylvania Insurance Department, "Initial Insurance Producer Licensing Process," pa.gov/agencies/insurance/licensing/licensees/initial-insurance-producer-licensing-process; checked 2026-09-05). The Life, Accident and Health examination is PSI series 16-03 and runs 150 items in 170 minutes; its largest single content area is Insurance Regulation at 21%, which is Pennsylvania law — not national theory (PSI, "Pennsylvania Producer's Examination for Life, Accident and Health Insurance, Series 16-03," proctor2.psionline.com/media/programs/pains/16-03.pdf; checked 2026-09-05). [Verify the current examination fee and the passing score in PSI's Pennsylvania candidate bulletin. The Department's old testing-fee page has been retired, and the only PSI document we could retrieve carrying those two figures is dated 2022 and is already wrong about the fingerprinting fee — so we will not print either number here.]
3. Submit fingerprints so the Department can receive national criminal history records information from the FBI Criminal Justice Information Services Division, at the applicant's expense (40 P.S. §310.5(a)(2); checked 2026-09-05). Pennsylvania runs this through IdentoGO under the Department's service code, and the Department's fee schedule lists the criminal history record report fee at $26.20, paid at the enrollment center when the prints are submitted (Pennsylvania Insurance Department, "Initial Insurance Producer Licensing Process" and Fee Schedule; checked 2026-09-05). The Department's instruction is to pass the examination and apply for licensure first, and only then book the fingerprinting appointment.
4. Apply on the Department's prescribed form — Pennsylvania processes producer licensing electronically through NIPR/Sircon — and pay the license fee: a nonrefundable $55 for a resident insurance producer license and a nonrefundable $110 for a nonresident license. The statute sets both figures "until modified by the department by regulation," and the Department's current published fee schedule still carries the same two numbers (40 P.S. §310.5(c); Pennsylvania Insurance Department, Fee Schedule, pa.gov/content/dam/copapwp-pagov/en/insurance/documents/licensees/documents/currentforms/licensingfeeschedule.pdf; checked 2026-09-05). Adding a line of authority to an existing producer license is $25 (same fee schedule; checked 2026-09-05).
5. Meet the fitness standards. The Department issues the license when the applicant has reached 18 years of age, has not committed any act prohibited under the act, has passed or is exempt from the licensing examination for the lines applied for, has paid all applicable fees, and possesses the general fitness, competence and reliability sufficient to satisfy the department that the applicant is worthy of licensure (40 P.S. §310.6(a); checked 2026-09-05). Note that the old "has satisfied the preexamination education requirements" criterion is no longer on that list — Act 142 of 2024 deleted it.

Appointment by insurers

Pennsylvania is an appointment state. A producer must be appointed by each insurer for which the producer sells, solicits, or negotiates, and the insurer files the appointment with the Department and pays an annual appointment fee for each producer appointed during the preceding calendar year — billed to the insurer "regardless of the length of time the producer held the appointment with the insurer" and payable in full within 30 days (40 P.S. §310.71(e); checked 2026-09-05). Recent change — learn the number the Department actually bills, not the one printed in the statute book. Section 671-A sets the fee at $12.50 but adds that "the appointment fee may be modified by regulation," and the Department has modified it: its current published fee schedule lists the Annual Appointment Fee at $15.00 per licensee (Pennsylvania Insurance Department, Fee Schedule; checked 2026-09-05). If an exam item quotes the statute, the statutory figure is $12.50; the money an insurer pays today is $15.00.

Termination. An insurer that terminates a producer's appointment must notify the Department in writing, on an approved form or through an approved electronic process, within 30 days following the effective date of the termination, and must tell the Department if the reason was a violation of the act. Three more day counts hang off that one, and they are commonly confused: the insurer must mail the producer a copy of the notification within 15 days of making it, by certified mail return receipt requested or by overnight carrier; the producer may then file written comments with the Department within 30 days of receiving it (simultaneously copying the insurer the same way); and an insurer or licensee that fails to report, or that a court finds reported falsely with malice, may have its license or certificate of authority suspended or revoked and face civil penalties not to exceed $5,000 for each violation (40 P.S. §310.71a(a), (b), (d), (e); checked 2026-09-05). Insurers, their authorized representatives, licensees, and the Commissioner have statutory immunity for information furnished under these provisions in the absence of actual malice (40 P.S. §310.71a(f); checked 2026-09-05).

Two classic traps: a license and an appointment are different things — you can hold a license with no appointments, but you may not transact for an insurer that has not appointed you; and losing every appointment does not cancel your license.

Term, renewal, and continuing education

A Pennsylvania producer license is issued only in the name of the applicant or business entity, in paper or electronic form, nontransferable, in one or more lines of authority, and for a period not to exceed two years (40 P.S. §310.7; checked 2026-09-05). If you do business under a fictitious name other than the one on the license, you must notify the Commissioner in writing before you use it (40 P.S. §310.7(1); checked 2026-09-05). Renewal requires the completed renewal form, the fee, and verification that the required continuing education is done; a resident who has not previously submitted fingerprints must submit them at renewal (40 P.S. §310.8(a); checked 2026-09-05). The renewal fees are $55 resident, $110 nonresident, and $165 for a lapsed license, and the statute and the Department's current fee schedule carry the same three numbers (40 P.S. §310.8(f); Pennsylvania Insurance Department, Fee Schedule; checked 2026-09-05).

Lapse mechanics, which carry their own day counts and are tested. A licensee who lets a license lapse may ask the Department to reinstate it within one year of the license renewal date, submitting the renewal form, the lapsed-license fee, and proof of the continuing education for the lapsed period. Reinstatement is retroactive to the date the license lapsed if the Department receives all of that within 60 days after the lapse, and prospective only — effective the date of reinstatement — if it arrives more than 60 days after the lapse. After one year, the person must reapply for the license from the beginning (40 P.S. §310.8(d); checked 2026-09-05). [Verify the renewal-date convention — how the Department assigns and staggers each licensee's expiration date — with the Pennsylvania Insurance Department. It is administrative practice, not a figure stated in the statute, and we could not source it.]

Continuing education. Pennsylvania requires continuing education: "A licensee shall successfully complete 24 credit hours of approved continuing education for each two-year license period as a condition for license renewal unless modified by the department by regulation" (40 P.S. §310.8(b)(1); checked 2026-09-05).

Recent change — Act 142 of 2024 carved two specialty requirements out of that same 24. "For each licensee, at least three of the 24 credit hours of approved continuing education required under paragraph (1) must be on the topic of ethics." And "for each licensee with a property and casualty line of authority, at least two of the 24 credit hours … must be on the topic of flood insurance" (40 P.S. §310.8(b)(2), (b)(3), amended Oct. 31, 2024, P.L.1155, No.142; checked 2026-09-05). Read that structure closely, because it is where items are set: neither requirement is added on top of the 24 — both are carved out of the 24; the ethics hours apply to every licensee, life and health included; and the flood hours attach to the property and casualty line of authority, not to personal lines generally. The phase-in was symmetrical for both: a producer licensed before the subparagraph took effect had to satisfy it within 12 months of the effective date or by the end of the license period then running, whichever period is longer; a producer licensed on or after that date must satisfy it on or before the end of the first license period. Mechanics that are tested regardless of the numbers: