What This License Is
South Carolina's Accident and Health line is defined at §38-43-75(A)(2) as coverage "for sickness, bodily injury, or accidental death and may include benefits for disability income." On NIPR and State Based Systems the line is styled Accident & Health or Sickness; on the exam it is Accident and Health. Same authority, two labels — worth knowing before you fill in a dropdown.
The line is broader than the name suggests. It carries individual and group major medical, disability income, Medicare supplement, dental and vision, and long-term care — and long-term care brings a statutory training requirement that has nothing to do with your CE total (see Continuing Education below).
What it does not carry is life. Disability income sits in an odd place in South Carolina's statute: §38-43-75(A)(1) says the Life line "may include benefits for disability income" and §38-43-75(A)(2) says the same of Accident and Health. In practice carriers appoint disability writers under health authority, but if you expect to sell both life and disability, the combined license removes the question entirely.
Exam Options & Format
The Accident and Health exam is InsSC-AH02: 85 total items in 120 minutes for $59. Pearson VUE's South Carolina content outline splits that into 75 scored questions — 50 general and 25 South Carolina — plus 10 unscored pretest items. The structure is identical to the Life exam's; only the subject matter changes.
Passing means reaching a scaled score of 70 on a 0-100 scale, a standard set by the South Carolina Department of Insurance. The handbook is explicit that scores "should not be interpreted as the percentage or number of correct answers," so do not do arithmetic against 75. You get your result on screen the moment you finish; if you fail, the score report includes a numeric score and diagnostic feedback on the general portion.
The combined Life, Accident and Health exam (InsSC-LAH03) costs the same $59 for 140 items in 150 minutes. Since South Carolina prices every exam identically, the only real cost of the combined route is 30 extra minutes and the life material — and the only real cost of the single-line route is that adding life later means a second exam day.
If your test date falls on or after September 15, 2026, download the second set of content outlines in Pearson VUE's South Carolina outline document. Two sets are published side by side, and the September 15 revision changes topical content without changing the item counts.
Most Tested Topics on the South Carolina Accident and Health Exam
South Carolina's health section is unusually statute-heavy: the state has its own prompt-pay regime, its own continuation rule, and its own binding external review. These are the verified numbers:
| Concept | The South Carolina rule |
|---|---|
| Grace period, accident and health | Tiered by premium mode: 7 days weekly, 10 days monthly, 31 days for every other mode (§38-71-340(3)) |
| Time limit on certain defenses | 2 years from the issue date; after that only fraudulent misstatements can void the policy (§38-71-340(2)) |
| Notice of claim | Within 20 days after a covered loss starts, or as soon as reasonably possible (§38-71-340(5)) |
| Proof of loss | Within 90 days (§38-71-340(7)) |
| Free look, individual accident and health | 10 days from receipt — 30 days for a direct response policy (§38-71-150) |
| Health nonrenewal notice | At least 31 days' written notice of nonrenewal (§38-71-335(C)) |
| Clean claim paid electronically | 20 business days (§38-59-230) |
| Clean claim paid on paper | 40 business days — South Carolina is one of the states that splits the deadline by submission method (§38-59-230) |
| Interest on a late clean claim | Accrues from the 21st or 41st business day at the legal rate in §34-31-20(A) (§38-59-240) |
| State continuation ("mini-COBRA") | The fractional policy month remaining at termination plus 6 additional policy months, for an employee continuously insured at least 6 months, paying the entire group premium including the employer's former share (§38-71-770) |
| External review | The independent review organization's decision is binding on the carrier, under the Health Carrier External Review Act (§38-71-1990) |
| Long-term care free look | 30 days from delivery of the policy or certificate (§38-72-60(F)(1)) |
| Medicaid status | South Carolina has not expanded Medicaid; adult coverage runs through the parent/caretaker category, not a 138%-of-poverty expansion group |
The grace-period tiers are the classic South Carolina health trap, because life and health answer the same question differently in the same state. Individual life is a flat 31 days regardless of mode (§38-63-220(i)); individual health is 7 / 10 / 31 by mode. A question that mentions a weekly-premium policy is testing whether you noticed the mode.
The second high-value cluster is the prompt-pay split. Most states set one clean-claim deadline; South Carolina sets 20 business days electronic, 40 business days paper, and starts interest the very next business day after each. Note business days, not calendar. And on continuation — §38-71-770 is worded around federal COBRA rather than an employee headcount: the statute denies state continuation to anyone "entitled under federal law to continuation of his coverage for a period of greater duration," which is what pushes it down to sub-COBRA employers in practice. If a question asks what the statute says, the answer is the six-month prior-coverage test and the six-months-plus-fraction duration, not "fewer than 20 employees."
Taking the South Carolina Exam Online with OnVUE
South Carolina is one of the states where online proctored testing is genuinely available — worth saying plainly, because several vendors have quietly discontinued remote insurance testing and stale guides still promise it where it no longer exists. Pearson VUE maintains a dedicated South Carolina insurance OnVUE page, the South Carolina program page offers candidates the choice to test "in person at a Pearson VUE Authorized Test Center or online in the comfort and privacy of your home," and the candidate handbook itself contemplates OnVUE score reporting.
What your equipment must do. Pearson VUE's published South Carolina requirements are specific: Windows 10 or macOS 14 or higher; a working webcam, microphone and speaker — no headphones or headsets; one display screen only, so a laptop docked to an external monitor must be undocked; and a stable connection of at least 6 Mbps download and 2 Mbps upload. Run Pearson VUE's system test on the actual machine, in the actual room, on the actual network you will use — not on the office wifi you will not be sitting on.
Check in 30 minutes early — not 15. This is the number candidates most often get wrong, because the in-person rule is different. The handbook tells test-center candidates to report fifteen minutes before the exam; OnVUE tells you to begin check-in 30 minutes before your appointment. Check-in is not a formality: you photograph your ID, photograph yourself, and pan your camera around the room for the proctor.
ID rules are stricter online. The general standard is the same — a valid, unexpired, government-issued photo ID bearing a signature, in English, with a name that exactly matches your registration. But OnVUE additionally rejects "expired, digital, damaged, copied, or privately issued IDs." A phone photo of your license is not an ID. A cracked license with an unreadable signature strip is a real risk online in a way it is not across a counter.
Your room is now the test center. Everything the handbook bans from a test center applies at your kitchen table: no phones, no watches, no notes, no second screen, no food or drink unless pre-approved, nobody else in the room, and no one walking through it. A proctor who sees a person enter can end your session. If you live with other people and cannot guarantee a closed door for two uninterrupted hours, book a test center — the Property guide covers the nine South Carolina cities where they sit.
One caveat to check at booking. Pearson VUE's South Carolina OnVUE page does not state that every South Carolina exam code is OnVUE-eligible. The delivery option appears during scheduling, so confirm it for InsSC-AH02 specifically when you book rather than assuming it from the program page.
What It Costs
$59 to Pearson VUE for InsSC-AH02 and $25 to the Department through NIPR — roughly $84 in published fees for a first-attempt pass. Testing online costs the same as testing at a center; South Carolina charges a single flat exam price and OnVUE carries no surcharge.
Two costs deliberately carry no number here. South Carolina publishes no fingerprint fee — §38-43-100(F) says only that the applicant bears the cost of the records checks, and neither SCDOI nor IdentoGO states an amount. NIPR's transaction fee is disclosed at checkout. Treat any site that quotes you an exact South Carolina fingerprint price as quoting itself.
If you intend to sell long-term care, budget for the eight-hour training course before your first sale — that is a §38-72-69 requirement, not a fee the state collects.
Eligibility Requirements
§38-43-100(F) requires that you be at least eighteen, be of good moral character with no felony or §38-43-130 disqualifying act in the last ten years and no dishonesty-related misdemeanor in the last five, have paid the §38-43-80 fees, and have passed the exam for each line you request.
There is no residency or business-presence test in the statute. The practical requirement is an address — NIPR asks for a South Carolina residence and/or business address, and §38-43-107 requires you to report any change of legal name or address to the Department within thirty days.
Fingerprints go to SLED for the state check and to the FBI for the national one, and they are a one-time requirement: §38-43-100(G) exempts a continuously licensed producer from re-printing at renewal.
Keeping Your Health License Active
Important CE details: Continuing education records, transcripts and course approvals run through State Based Systems (SBS), which replaced Prometric as the Department's CE administrator effective July 1, 2019. Note the vendor split: Pearson VUE gives the exams, SBS holds the CE and licence record, NIPR takes the fees.
South Carolina licenses renew biennially by the last day of your birth month, in years matching your birth year's odd/even parity (§38-43-106, §38-43-110). Each cycle takes 24 hours of approved CE including 3 hours of ethics, and the renewal fee is $25.
The long-term care gate is the requirement health producers most often discover late. §38-72-69 — statute, not regulation — provides that an individual "may not sell, solicit, or negotiate long term care insurance" without having completed a one-time course and ongoing training every twenty-four months, and sets the floors at eight hours one-time and four hours ongoing. You must give the insurer proof of the eight hours before you sell. Note that this is separate from your 24-hour CE total in kind, even where the same approved course also earns CE credit.
If you later add life authority and sell annuities, Regulation 69-29's one-time four-hour annuity training applies as well — the Life guide covers it. The Property & Casualty guide covers renewal mechanics in depth, including the six-month reinstatement window and the exemption for producers with 25 or more years of South Carolina licensure who are at least 65.
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