BY ZANA RAYBON, FBPE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR & FEMC PRESIDENT
As most of you know by now, renewal for 2019-2021 biennium concluded on Feb. 28, 2021. To date, we have had 36,809 Professional Engineers renew their licenses.
Although most of Florida’s licensees have renewed their license, there are several PEs who have paid for renewal and, for lack of responding to the attestation questions, have not completed the renewal process. That means their PE licenses are currently delinquent and will remain delinquent until their renewal applications are finished (attestations are answered).
Those licensees will owe a $25 delinquent fee at this point as well.
Make sure to check your license status at myfloridalicense.com to ensure your PE license has an expiration date of Feb. 28, 2023.
We have also gotten a lot of questions about renewing Certificates of Authorization for engineering firms. Remember, CAs went away in 2019 pursuant to a statute change.
All CAs were moved to a business registry and never need to be renewed. But keep in mind, engi-neering firms must always have a qualifying agent, which is a licensed PE whose license is linked to the firm at myfloridalicense.com.
You can check to see that your engineering company is currently on the registry by going to myfloridalicense.com and searching for the name of your engineering firm.
Next up for FBPE is the renewal of licenses for continuing education providers, which has already opened. If you are a provider, you may go online right now and renew your provider license. If you have any questions, please contact Nancy Wilkins at nwilkins@fbpe.org.
Finally, we will begin randomly selecting Professional Engineers in the next few months for an audit to determine if they completed their continuing education during the 2019-21 biennium. If you are selected for the audit, you may expect to receive a letter sometime in July 2021.
Those selected for the audit will be required to respond within 30 days of receipt of notification with copies of all documentation of continuing education activities. Those PEs being audited must show evidence of completing 18 continuing education hours between March 1, 2019, and Feb. 28, 2021. Of those 18 hours, four hours shall relate to the licensee’s area(s) of practice; one hour shall relate to professional ethics; and one hour shall relate to Chapter 471, Florida Statutes, and the rules of the Board. The remaining 12 hours may relate to any topic pertinent to the practice of engineering as defined in Rule 61G15-22.002, Florida Administrative Code.
If you were licensed by examination in Florida during the 2019-21 biennium, you are not required to comply with the continuing education requirements as a part of renewal. You were required to pay only the renewal fee.
Please be advised that failure to comply with the audit will result in the possible suspension of your Florida PE license, and you will be referred to our legal department for further action.
If you have not printed your new PE license, log into your account at myfloridalicense.com and fol-low the directions for printing, which can also be found at How Do I Print My License on the FBPE website.