What This License Is
A producer holding both the Life and the Accident, Health and Sickness lines can sell the full personal-risk shelf in Alaska: term and permanent life, annuities, disability income, major medical, Medicare supplement, dental, vision and long-term care. It is the most common combination in the state and the one most agency contracts assume.
The structural fact to absorb first: Alaska issues no combined Life and Health license examination. There is no L&H exam code. You sit Life, level 01 and Health, level 02, each split into a General Knowledge part and an Alaska Specific part — four parts, 180 scored questions. The 2023 handbook's Examination Requirements Chart prints the row as 220 questions, which is the two 110-item exams added together under the older counts.
What Alaska does combine is the fee. The handbook is explicit: candidates may take up to two examinations in one session at a physical Pearson VUE test center for a single fee, and Life plus Health is an allowable pairing. Test online instead and you pay twice — OnVUE applies no multi-exam discount. That one sentence is worth roughly the cost of a second exam.
Exam Options & Format
Life, level 01 and Health, level 02 each carry a general part and an Alaska part. Per the March 2025 content outlines each exam is 90 scored questions — 50 general plus 40 Alaska — with pretest items on top; the 2023 handbook gives higher item counts (60 and 50, for 110 per exam). Handbook timings are 1 hour 15 minutes for each general part and 1 hour for each Alaska part, so a combined sitting runs roughly four and a half hours including check-in.
The two Alaska parts overlap by design. Each is built as about 30 questions of material common to all lines plus about 10 line-specific questions. In practice that means you answer the same Alaska licensing, trade-practice and claim-handling core twice — a real advantage when studying, and a reason the second line costs far less preparation time than the first.
Each exam is scored on its own. A scaled 70 is required on each, and passing one does not bank it against the other. If you fail one, the handbook requires you to retake that examination in full, both parts — there is no partial credit for a passed part. Each exam's score also runs its own one-year validity clock from its own test date, which matters if you sit them months apart.
Most Tested Topics Across the Alaska Life and Health Exams
For a candidate sitting both lines, the highest-yield Alaska material is the part that appears on both Alaska sections: the guaranty association, the replacement rules, and the continuing-education arithmetic. Learn these once and they pay twice.
| Concept | The Alaska rule |
|---|---|
| Guaranty association | Alaska Life and Health Insurance Guaranty Association (AS 21.79) |
| Life death benefit limit | $300,000 — AS 21.79.025(a)(2)(A) |
| Life cash surrender / withdrawal value | $100,000 |
| Annuity limit | $250,000 present value |
| Health benefit plan limit | $500,000 |
| Disability income and long-term care | $300,000 each |
| Other health benefits | $100,000 |
| Aggregate cap per individual life | $300,000 — rising to $500,000 where a health benefit plan is involved (AS 21.79.025(d)(1)) |
| Guaranty as a sales inducement | Expressly prohibited — no advertisement may use the association's existence to sell insurance |
| Free look on a replacement | 30 days, unconditional refund of all premiums (3 AAC 26.805(a)(5)) |
| Replacement notice | Producer must read the notice aloud unless the applicant declines; both sign (3 AAC 26.795) |
| Replacement recordkeeping | Statement and sales material kept 5 years; existing insurer notified within 5 working days |
| Continuing education | 24 hours per two years, 3 of them ethics — and holding both lines does not raise it |
The aggregate cap is the item that separates candidates who memorized a list from candidates who understood it. The individual product limits are ceilings for those products; the $300,000 aggregate per life is a ceiling across all of them, so a claimant with a $300,000 death benefit and a $250,000 annuity from the same insolvent insurer does not collect $550,000. The exception is the one to remember: where a health benefit plan is in the mix, the aggregate rises to $500,000.
The replacement rules are the other reliable source of missed questions, because Alaska imposes a duty most states do not: the producer must read the replacement notice aloud to the applicant before or at the time of application unless the applicant declines, and both parties sign certifying which happened. Pair that with the 30-day unconditional right to return a replacement policy — triple the ordinary 10-day free look — and you have two of the most testable facts on either Alaska section.
Exam Day in Alaska — Check-In, ID and the Rules That Cost People Money
Arrive 30 minutes early — and in Alaska, think about the day before as well. The handbook says candidates should report to the test center at least thirty minutes before the examination; testing online, you begin check-in at the same thirty-minute mark. For a combined Life and Health sitting, budget five hours door to door. Only Anchorage has a dedicated Pearson Professional Center; the other eleven sites the handbook lists are hosted on college and vocational campuses, several of them reachable only by air, so a missed appointment here can cost a flight as well as the fee.
Bring two IDs to a test center — this is where Alaska is stricter than the online path. The handbook requires two forms of current signature identification, and the name on the identification must exactly match the name on the registration. The primary ID must carry both a photograph and a signature and must not be expired: a government-issued driver's license, a U.S. Department of State driver's license, a plastic learner's permit bearing photo and signature, a national or state identification card, a passport or passport card, a military ID, or a Permanent Resident Card. The secondary ID needs only a signature and a current date — a debit or credit card will do, as will any second primary ID.
The name-match rule fails more check-ins than anything else. Pearson VUE's Alaska page tells candidates in capitals to create the web account with the legal name exactly as it appears on the government-issued ID. A middle initial on the license and none on the booking, or a married name on one and a maiden name on the other, is enough to be turned away — with the fee gone. Fix the account before you book, not on the day.
OnVUE differs deliberately: one valid government-issued photo ID matching the booking name, rather than two documents. If you have only one usable form of identification, the online route may be the only route.
Rescheduling and canceling. For a test center, call Pearson VUE at (800) 274-5993 at least 48 hours before the appointment; with proper notice you may transfer the fee to a new reservation or request a refund. Without proper notice you forfeit the examination fee — the whole of it, with no partial tier. Online appointments can be changed or canceled at least 24 hours ahead, through the OnVUE scheduling page. Appointments themselves may be made as late as one calendar day before the desired date, subject to seats.
Results. Pass and your score report says only pass — no number. Fail and you receive a numeric score for each failed part, and for Part 1 of the Life, Health and Property and Casualty examinations a diagnostic breakdown by major content area. The [Personal Lines guide](/insurance/alaska/personal-lines/licensing-guide) covers score reporting and retake strategy in full.
Alaska's Temporary Producer License — Who Actually Qualifies
Alaska does issue temporary producer licenses, and a good deal of secondary material says otherwise. What is true is narrower than the phrase suggests: this is a business-continuity device, not a work-while-you-study permit. There is no Alaska equivalent of the sponsored temporary license some states grant to candidates who have not yet passed the exam.
AS 21.27.390(a) allows the director to issue a temporary license to a person who is qualified except for a lack of experience, training or passage of the examination, in four situations only:
1. To the surviving spouse, next of kin, or personal representative of the estate of a licensed producer who has died — so the book of business can be serviced or sold rather than abandoned.
2. To a family member or the guardian of a licensed producer who has become disabled.
3. To the surviving members of a firm on the death of the firm's compliance officer.
4. To the designee of a producer entering military service.
The duration is the tested number. AS 21.27.390(b) says a temporary license "may not be in effect for more than 90 consecutive days and may not be renewed or reissued for more than one additional 90-day period" — 90 days, renewable once, 180 days maximum, full stop. Subsection (c) adds a real limit on scope: the temporary licensee may not represent insurers the original licensee did not already represent. You are continuing someone else's business, not starting your own.
Two consequences worth carrying. First, temporary licensees are exempt from continuing education under 3 AAC 23.100 — the exemption follows from the license being short-lived. Second, do not confuse any of this with the Independent Adjuster Trainee license, a separate credential that runs up to twelve months and is non-renewable under AS 21.27.380(e); it is an adjuster credential and has nothing to do with producer licensing.
If you are the survivor or representative in one of these situations, the practical route is the Division's licensing team — insurancelicensing@alaska.gov, (907) 269-7900 — rather than NIPR, because the qualifying circumstances have to be established before the license is issued.
What It Costs
The arithmetic that matters here is the combination. Two exams in one test-center session cost one exam fee; the same two exams sat separately, or either one sat online, cost two. Since the license fee is $75 flat for any or all lines and the fingerprint fee is a single $47 regardless, the exam booking is the only place where holding two lines can cost more than holding one.
Neither the fingerprinter's rolling charge nor NIPR's transaction fee is published, so treat the total below as the floor rather than the number. Everything paid to the Division is nonrefundable under 3 AAC 31.010, including on a withdrawn application.
Eligibility Requirements
One set of qualifications covers both lines: 18 or older, a bona fide Alaska resident before a resident license issues, and a passing score on each required examination (AS 21.27.020). Alaska requires no pre-licensing education, and 3 AAC 23 Article 1 — all thirty-six sections of it — contains no education prerequisite. The old "licensing by credentials" regulation, 3 AAC 23.060, has been repealed.
That repeal matters for a question producers often ask: Alaska grants no professional-designation waiver. A CLU, ChFC, CPCU, CIC or FLMI does not exempt you from the exam. The exemption list in AS 21.27.060(d) is exhaustive and contains only limited-lines licenses, prior licensure in good standing within the preceding year under substantially similar requirements, and third-party-administrator or pharmacy-benefit-manager compliance officers. The [P&C guide](/insurance/alaska/property-and-casualty/licensing-guide) covers the waivers that do exist.
Keeping Both Lines Active
Important CE details: 24 credit hours per two-year license period, of which at least 3 must be insurance ethics (3 AAC 23.100). Holding more lines of authority does not raise the number. Up to 8 hours carry forward; no more than 8 hours may come from management, marketing and sales training, and those hours cannot be carried over.
Holding two lines does not double your continuing education. 3 AAC 23.100 is explicit that a person licensed for more than one class of authority "is not required to complete a greater number of credit hours than is required of a person holding a license for one class of authority." You owe 24 credit hours per two-year period, at least 3 in insurance ethics — the same as a single-line producer.
Two product obligations sit outside that total for a Life and Health producer: the one-time four-hour annuity best-interest course (3 AAC 26.778(b)) before recommending an annuity, and the long-term care certification — eight credit hours initially, then four every twenty-four months (AS 21.53.066). Neither is a CE substitute; both are conditions of selling the product.
Three ceilings shape whether those 24 hours actually land: 8 hours of carryover, 8 hours of management, marketing and sales training (which never carry), and — the subtle one — ethics hours that carry forward arrive as plain general credit, so they cannot be spent on next cycle's ethics requirement. A licensee whose very first period runs shorter than a full two years escapes the requirement entirely.
Quick Reference
Official Links
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