What This License Is
The combined license carries two of the lines of authority in §38-43-75(A): life — "life insurance coverage on human lives including benefits of endowment and annuities" — and accident and health — coverage "for sickness, bodily injury, or accidental death." One license, two lines, issued by the South Carolina Department of Insurance.
The practical case for it is arithmetic. South Carolina prices every producer exam at $59, whether it is 80 items or 140. Two single-line exams cost $118 and two mornings; the combined exam costs $59 and one. The only reason to take a single-line exam in this state is that you are certain you will never sell the other side.
The combined license does not automatically carry variable products. Variable life and variable annuities are a separate South Carolina line of authority requiring FINRA registration and a CRD number on the application, though the state does not require an additional exam for it. Nor does it carry long-term care by itself: §38-72-69 imposes a separate training requirement before you sell LTC, covered in the Accident & Health guide.
Exam Options & Format
InsSC-LAH03 is 140 total items in 150 minutes for $59. The content outline splits it into 130 scored questions — 100 general and 30 South Carolina — plus 10 unscored pretest items. Two things stand out against the single-line exams. The general section doubles to 100 questions, as you would expect. The South Carolina section only rises from 25 to 30 — so the state-law block is proportionally smaller on the combined exam, but it now has to cover both life and health statutes in those 30 questions.
Pacing is comfortable: 140 items in 150 minutes is about 64 seconds per question, and most candidates finish with time in hand. The passing standard is a scaled score of 70 on a 0-100 scale, set by the Department of Insurance, and the handbook is explicit that scores "should not be interpreted as the percentage or number of correct answers."
Both single-line alternatives remain available at the same $59 — InsSC-Life01 and InsSC-AH02, each 85 items in 120 minutes. And note the September boundary: Pearson VUE publishes two sets of South Carolina content outlines, one for exams taken before September 15, 2026 and one for exams on or after. The item counts are identical across the boundary; the topics are not. Download the set that matches your test date.
Most Tested Topics on the South Carolina Life, Accident and Health Exam
Thirty scored questions cover both chapters of South Carolina law, and two clusters carry most of them: the guaranty association's dollar limits, and the free-look ladder that runs across every product you can sell on this license. The limits below were read clause by clause out of §38-29-40(3)(b):
| Concept | The South Carolina rule |
|---|---|
| Guaranty association, life and health | The South Carolina Life and Accident and Health Insurance Guaranty Association (Title 38, Chapter 29) |
| Coverage limit, life death benefits | $300,000 with respect to any one life (§38-29-40(3)(b)) |
| Coverage limit, life net cash surrender and withdrawal values | $300,000 — South Carolina deliberately sits above the NAIC model's $100,000 |
| Coverage limit, annuity present value | $300,000, including net cash surrender and withdrawal values — again above the model's $250,000 |
| Coverage limit, health benefit plans | $500,000 — the single highest sublimit in the statute |
| Coverage limit, disability income and long-term care | $300,000 each, stated separately in the statute |
| Coverage limit, other health coverages | $300,000, including net cash surrender and withdrawal values |
| Aggregate cap per any one life | $300,000 — rising to $500,000 where health benefit plans are involved |
| Cap for one owner of multiple nongroup life policies | $5,000,000, regardless of the number of policies held (§38-29-40(3)(b)(iii)) |
| Guaranty association in a sales pitch | Prohibited. No person may advertise or use the Association's existence "for the purpose of sales, solicitation, or inducement to purchase" (§38-29-200) |
| The free-look ladder across L&H products | 10 days ordinary life and annuity; 20 days on replacement; 31 days direct response; 10 days individual A&H (30 direct response); 30 days long-term care |
| Long-term care rider treatment | A long-term care rider on a life policy or annuity is covered as the same type of benefit as the base contract, not as separate LTC coverage (§38-29-40(3)(b)(v)) |
| Continuing education, hours and ethics | 24 hours biennially, of which 3 must be ethics (§38-43-106; the ethics hours trace to DOI Bulletin 2007-06, not to the statute) |
| CE split for dual-licensed producers | Hold both P&C and L,A&H and at least one-third of the 24 hours must relate to each — 8 and 8, plus the 3 ethics (§38-43-106) |
| CE carryover | Up to 18 credit hours earned in excess carry forward to the next biennial period (§38-43-106) |
| CE exemption for long-service producers | Exempt if you have 25 or more years of South Carolina licensure and are 65 or older — both conditions, added by 2022 Act No. 167 |
The guaranty limits are where South Carolina most rewards a candidate who studied the state rather than the model act. National material teaches the NAIC structure — $300,000 death benefit, $100,000 cash surrender value, $250,000 annuity present value. South Carolina raised the last two to $300,000, which makes the state's structure unusually flat: nearly everything is $300,000 except health benefit plans at $500,000. If a question gives you $100,000 or $250,000 as an option for South Carolina, it is testing whether you memorized the model instead of the Code.
The free-look ladder is the second reliable cluster, and it is best learned as a shape rather than a list. Ordinary life and annuity: 10. Replacement: 20 — the transaction with the most regulatory suspicion gets double the window. Direct response: 31 on life and annuity, 30 on individual accident and health — note the one-day difference, which is real and comes from two different statutes (§38-63-220(b) and §38-69-120 versus §38-71-150). Long-term care: 30 (§38-72-60(F)(1)). And on the CE side, the item most often stated wrongly is the long-service exemption: it requires both 25 years of South Carolina licensure and age 65, not either one.
Exam Day in South Carolina — Check-In, ID and the Rules Inside the Room
Arrive fifteen minutes early. The handbook is specific: "Candidates should report to the test center fifteen (15) minutes before the examination and check in with the test center administrator." Fifteen minutes is enough for the ID check, the digital signature and the locker, and not much else. (If you are testing online instead, the number is 30 minutes — OnVUE check-in is longer, and the Accident & Health guide covers it.)
Bring one government photo ID with a signature — not two. This is the detail most often misstated for South Carolina, because Pearson VUE's convention differs by program. The handbook says: "Candidate must present a valid and unexpired form of current identification. The primary identification must be government-issued and photo-bearing with a signature." One primary ID is the requirement. A secondary ID comes into play only in a narrow case — where the ID you present carries an embedded signature that is not visible or is difficult to read, such as a microchipped card.
What counts as primary. The handbook's accepted list: a government-issued driver's license, a U.S. Department of State driver's license, a U.S. learner's permit (plastic card only, with photo and signature), a national, state or country identification card, a passport or passport card, a military ID, or an alien registration card. Two hard constraints ride on top: the identification "must be in English", and it must "exactly match the name you used to register." If you registered as a married name and your license still shows a maiden name, fix the registration before test day, not at the counter.
What you cannot bring in. The handbook's prohibited list is broader than most candidates expect: "cellular phones, hand-held computers or other electronic devices, pagers, watches, wallets, purses, firearms or other weapons, hats, bags, coats, books, and/or notes, pens or pencils." Note three items people routinely forget — watches (including analog ones), hats, and your own pen or pencil. The center supplies what you are allowed to write with.
What you cannot do inside. Studying in the test center is prohibited, as are visitors — "visitors, children, family or friends" are not permitted to wait in the testing room. So is "eating, drinking, chewing gum, smoking, and/or making noise that creates a disturbance," removing exam materials or notes from the room, and giving or receiving help or using unauthorized aids. Any of these can end the session.
Accommodations. Pearson VUE "complies with the provisions of the Americans with Disabilities Act as amended … and provides reasonable and appropriate accommodations to individuals with documented disabilities." The handbook names a separate testing room, additional testing time, and a reader or recorder as examples. Request accommodations at registration; they cannot be arranged at the door.
Moving to South Carolina? You need not wait for the moving truck. The handbook provides that "as a new resident, you may pretest and take South Carolina licensing exams in any Pearson VUE test center nationwide before moving to South Carolina." Sit InsSC-LAH03 wherever you are, then file the South Carolina application once you have an address here.
Scheduling, rescheduling and the 48-hour cancellation rule are covered in the Property guide, which owns the test center and booking detail for every South Carolina line.
South Carolina's Temporary Producer License — What It Is and Is Not
South Carolina issues a temporary producer license under §38-43-102, and it is worth understanding precisely, because candidates regularly hope it is something it is not.
It is not a work-while-you-study permit. There is no route in South Carolina to sell insurance on a provisional basis while you prepare for InsSC-LAH03. The temporary license exists for a narrow purpose: to keep an existing book of business serviced when the producer behind it is suddenly gone.
Who qualifies. The statute contemplates the surviving spouse or the personal representative of a producer who has died or become disabled; a member or employee of an agency, on the death or disability of the designated licensed person; a designee of a producer entering active military service; and any other circumstance in which the Director finds the public interest is served.
How long it lasts: up to 180 days, and no exam is required. That is the whole point — the estate or the agency needs continuity now, not after a test date. The Director may limit the temporary licensee's authority and may require sponsorship by a licensed producer or agency who takes responsibility for the temporary licensee's conduct.
Why it matters even if you never hold one. Two reasons. First, it is exam material: the temporary-license circumstances are exactly the sort of enumerated list a state-law section likes. Second, it is a real planning tool for agency owners — a one-person agency whose principal dies without a designated successor puts every client's renewal at risk, and §38-43-102 is the mechanism that buys six months to sell the book or license a successor properly.
If what you actually want is to move an existing out-of-state license into South Carolina without re-examination, that is a different provision — §38-43-101, the prior-licensure exam waiver — and the Property & Casualty guide covers it in full.
What It Costs
$59 to Pearson VUE for InsSC-LAH03 and $25 to the Department through NIPR — about $84 in published fees for two lines of authority on a first-attempt pass. That is the cheapest way to hold both lines in South Carolina by a wide margin: the two single-line exams total $118 for the same authority.
Two costs carry no number: IdentoGO's fingerprint fee, paid at the appointment after you apply, and NIPR's transaction fee, shown at checkout. §38-43-100(F) puts the records-check cost on the applicant without setting an amount, and no primary source publishes one.
Budget separately for product-training courses if they apply to you: the one-time four-hour annuity training under Regulation 69-29 before you sell annuities, and the eight-hour long-term care course under §38-72-69 before you sell LTC. Both are provider-priced, not state fees, and both can earn CE credit when you take an approved version.
Eligibility Requirements
§38-43-100(F) requires the Director to find that you are at least eighteen years of age; are of good moral character with no felony or §38-43-130 disqualifying act within the last ten years and no misdemeanor involving dishonesty, breach of trust or other financial- or insurance-related crime within five; have paid the §38-43-80 fees; and have passed the examination for each line you apply for. For this license that is one exam covering both.
The statute sets no residency or business-presence requirement. What it requires is address discipline: §38-43-107 obliges you to give business, email, mailing and residential street addresses and to notify the Department within thirty days of a change in legal name or address — failure is itself a Title 38 violation carrying §38-2-10 penalties.
Fingerprints are required for new resident producers and are scheduled after the application is filed; the Casualty guide covers that sequence in detail, including why no universal service code is published.
Keeping Your Life and Health License Active
Important CE details: Miss your compliance deadline and the license moves to expired status the very next day. You then have six months to reinstate the same license by completing the missing hours and paying a $50 late CE compliance fee.
South Carolina licenses run biennially, renewing by the last day of your birth month in the years matching your birth year's odd/even parity (§38-43-106, §38-43-110). Each cycle takes 24 hours of approved continuing education including 3 hours of ethics; the renewal fee is $25.
Three mechanics decide how painful that is. Carryover: §38-43-106 permits up to 18 excess credit hours to roll into the next biennial period, so a heavy year is not wasted. The dual-license split: if you also hold property and casualty authority, at least one-third of the 24 hours must relate to each side — 8 and 8, plus the 3 ethics hours. The repeat rule: an approved course cannot be repeated for credit within two years of the date you first completed it.
Two product gates sit outside the CE arithmetic. Before selling annuities you need the one-time four-hour training under Regulation 69-29, amended to the NAIC best-interest standard by State Register Vol. 46, Issue 5, published May 27, 2022, with the regulation's own Section IX making it effective six months later — November 27, 2022 — for contracts sold on or after that date. Before selling long-term care you need §38-72-69's one-time course of no less than eight hours, plus four hours of ongoing training every twenty-four months, with proof furnished to the insurer.
And one exemption worth knowing: a licensee with 25 or more years of South Carolina licensure who is 65 or older is exempt from continuing education entirely (§38-43-106, added by 2022 Act No. 167). Both conditions are required — long service alone does not qualify, and neither does age. The Property & Casualty guide covers the renewal calendar, the six-month reinstatement window and what happens after it closes.
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