The Society of Actuaries is committed to serving the public, its members and its candidates. A key component is an education system that upholds rigorous standards while providing opportunities for qualified and committed candidates to succeed. In order to better meet these objectives, the SOA is implementing a new policy with regard to examination cancellations. Effective immediately, fees paid to the SOA for examination registration will no longer be refundable. That is, once a candidate is registered for an examination, no part of the fee will be refunded or transferred to a later exam period should the candidate not appear for the exam.

The main reasons for making this change are:

• Cancellations and no-shows incur costs for paper/pencil exams. Exam booklets must be printed, shipped and then returned to the SOA, whether or not a candidate shows up to take the exam.
• Cancellations and no-shows incur costs for computer-based exams. The cost is much greater for these exams. The SOA must pay a seat fee to our vendor, Prometric, whether or not the seat is occupied. Due to the higher than normal cancellation rate amongst our candidate body, Prometric is planning to raise this fee an additional $35.
• Cancellations and no-shows for computer-based exams create hardships for other candidates. There are a limited number of seats at each test center. When they are filled, candidates must either travel to a more distant center or wait until the next session. The current cancellation rate for Exam P is 20 percent and these seats are not available to candidates who are prepared to show up and progress through our education system. Most cancellations are made at extremely short notice making the seats impossible to reuse or reschedule.

The SOA expects this change to allow it to use exam revenue for its intended purpose–offering high quality exams to motivated future actuaries. Spending money on individuals who elect to not participate in our system is wasteful and inefficient. However, we recognize that events can occur that are outside the candidate's control. In those cases, there are two options that may be available:

• Rescheduling Options for CBT. Because computer-based exams are administered over several days, candidates will continue to have the option to reschedule their test appointment within the same testing window provided the request is made by noon of the second business day before the scheduled appointment, and also provided there is a seat available.
• Emergency Situations. The SOA recognizes that unforeseen emergencies may occur that directly influence a candidate's ability to take an exam on an appointed day. We will consider these situations on a case-by-case basis.

Questions may be directed to SOA Customer Service at customerservice@soa.org.