CPD Accreditation for Training Providers: How It Works, What It Costs, and Whether It Pays

CPD accreditation is an independent check that a course meets an accrediting body’s standard, so its learning time can be presented as continuing professional development under that body’s name and mark. For a training provider it is a growth decision rather than a legal one. It can make a course easier to sell to professionals and the companies that employ them, it costs money every year, and whether it matters depends on the profession your learners belong to. Start from what their professional body asks for, look at your sector’s own routes before a general CPD mark, test whether clients will pay more, and have your records and certificates ready before you apply.

Key takeaways

• The learner’s profession decides what counts. Most professional bodies leave members to judge which learning is relevant; a few, such as SHRM and PMI, let approved providers award credits directly.
• In some sectors, the sector’s own route matters more than any CPD mark: IOSH approval for health and safety courses, and CITB’s Training Provider Network in construction, where approved courses carry grants for employers.
• CPD accreditation is voluntary and, in the UK, unregulated. UK accreditors mostly quote on request; IACET in the US publishes its fees: $6,585 for the first year in 2026, then $1,245 a year.
• Test demand before you pay: ask clients, check rivals’ courses, and work out the uplift you need with the calculator below.
• Count only active learning time. A 9:00 to 5:00 day with an hour for lunch is seven CPD hours.

What CPD accreditation is, and what it is not

Continuing professional development is the learning professionals do to keep their skills current, and many professional bodies require their members to do and record it. CPD accreditation sits on the other side: a training provider asks an independent body to review its course or its organization, and if it meets the standard, the provider can describe the course as accredited CPD, show the body’s mark and state the hours or points.

It is not a qualification. A regulated qualification comes from an awarding organization under the rules of a qualifications regulator; a CPD-accredited course gives the learner evidence of learning time. It is not a license to train, and it is not a requirement. In the UK, accreditation is offered by independent organizations, each with its own criteria, prices and mark. The CPD Register, which certifies accreditors and sells that certification, describes the UK sector as “completely unregulated” and notes that “anyone can operate as a CPD accreditation provider”, so check who you are dealing with before you pay.

The units vary by body and profession:

Unit	Who uses it	How it works
CPD hour or point	UK CPD accreditors	The CPD Certification Service: “1 CPD point would be equal to 1 CPD hour”
CEU (Continuing Education Unit)	IACET and many US employers	”One (1) CEU is equivalent to ten (10) contact hours”
PDC (Professional Development Credit)	SHRM-certified HR professionals	One hour; “each 15-minute increment = .25”
PDU (Professional Development Unit)	PMI-certified project professionals	Earned toward renewal; pre-approved on courses from Professional and Premier Authorized Training Partners

Start with what your learners’ professions ask for

Before choosing an accreditor, look at the professional bodies your learners belong to. Most set an amount of CPD and leave the choice of activity to the member, and very few approve courses or providers.

Professional body	Where	What members must do	Does it approve providers?
RICS (surveyors)	Global	At least 20 hours a year, at least 10 of them formal CPD	Members record their own
CIPD (HR and L&D)	UK and international	Around 30 hours of planned learning a year recommended; at least three CPD records	Outcomes-based; members record their own
IOSH (health and safety)	UK and international	30 hours a year for Technical, Certified and Chartered members	Approves training providers for IOSH courses
NMC (nurses and midwives)	UK	35 hours over three years, at least 20 participatory	”We don’t prescribe any particular type of CPD”
HCPC (health and care professions)	UK	No set hours; CPD standards checked by audit	”We do not ‘approve’ or ‘endorse’ any CPD activities”
SRA (solicitors)	England and Wales	”There is no minimum requirement”	Members reflect and record
Law Society of Ireland (solicitors)	Ireland	At least 25 hours per practice year	”The Law Society does not accredit CPD providers”
Engineers Ireland	Ireland	35 hours a year	Members record their own
CPA Ontario (accountants)	Canada	20 hours a year, 120 over three years, half verifiable	Members log their own
CPA Australia (accountants)	Australia	120 hours over three years, at least 20 a year	External courses “can be recognised” by members
Engineers Australia	Australia	At least 150 hours every three years	Members record their own
SHRM (HR)	US and international	60 PDCs every three years	Approves Recertification Providers
PMI (project managers)	Global	PDUs to renew certifications	Approves Authorized Training Partners

What that means for a provider:

For most professions, your certificate is the evidence. A member who records “6 hours, structured course, with learning outcomes” needs a certificate that says so. CPA Ontario, for example, requires at least half of a member’s hours to be “verifiable” with “acceptable documentation”, and the Law Society of Ireland leaves it to “the individual solicitor to judge the quality and relevance of each CPD event they attend”. An accreditation mark helps them choose your course; a clear certificate is what they file.

Where a profession approves providers, that route beats a general mark. SHRM’s Recertification Provider program lets an approved organization “award PDCs for individual HR programs without preapproval from SHRM”, and PMI’s Authorized Training Partners deliver PMI’s own course content, with “pre-approved PDUs” from the Professional tier. If your learners hold those certifications, apply there first.

The structured share matters. RICS defines formal CPD as “structured learning that has clear learning objectives and outcomes, such as a professional course”, and the NMC asks for at least 20 participatory hours out of 35. Structured courses with stated outcomes are what these members need for those parts.

Sector routes that can matter more than a CPD mark

Some sectors have their own approval schemes, and for providers in those sectors they usually come first.

Health and safety: IOSH. IOSH approves training providers to deliver its courses, such as Managing Safely, and has “1,400” training partners, delivering awareness training “in around 130 countries”. To deliver an IOSH course, a provider needs at least one trainer who “is a Technical Member of IOSH” and “is up to date with their continuing professional development”. That trainer also “has a level 3 adult training qualification on a regulated framework or has completed the IOSH Train the Trainer course”, and “has two years’ substantial face-to-face training experience”. IOSH also assesses providers’ own courses, and successful ones can “use the IOSH logo as evidence that your training meets the same high standards”. IOSH does not publish its fees on these pages.

Construction in Great Britain: CITB. “It is no longer possible to apply to become an ATO”, CITB’s former approved-provider status; the route now is its Training Provider Network. “There are no fees or charges to become a member”, though fees apply to CITB products and sometimes to quality assurance. Members need a quality management system, public liability insurance of at least £5 million and professional indemnity of at least £2 million. CITB reviews applications “within 10 working days” and makes a first quality assurance visit within three months.

The commercial reason is grants. Employers registered with CITB can claim short-course grants, from £60 to £500 per course in the examples CITB lists for scaffolding, for courses of “at least 3 hours” delivered by approved providers listed on its Construction Training Directory. If the provider is not a member, “you must apply for grant through the CITB Online Services portal within 52 weeks of the achievement date”: the employer can still claim, but has to do it themselves.

Professions that approve providers. SHRM and PMI, above. In the US, IACET accredits organizations against the ANSI/IACET standard, and its CEUs are a common unit for continuing education. For the software that takes continuing education registrations and records the credit, see course and class registration software.

The general CPD routes compared

Route	What is accredited	Price	How long it takes	How long it lasts
The CPD Certification Service (UK)	Courses and events, under a membership sized to the number of activities	On request: “Please contact our team"	"Typically takes 10-14 working days”	Membership
The CPD Standards Office (UK)	Courses, conferences and webinars	On request: “no single fixed price”; 15% off the second year	Up to 30 days; 14 days for an extra fee	”A minimum of two years”, then yearly
IACET (US, ANSI/IACET 1-2018 standard)	The organization, not individual courses	$495 standard and application, $4,845 review, $1,245 a year (2026)	Review “generally three to four months”	Five years
SHRM Recertification Provider	The organization, for HR programs	$500 for up to 10 programs, $600 for up to 20, $800 unlimited, per cycle	Programs entered before they run	Renewed every two years
PMI Authorized Training Partner	The organization, with PMI’s own course content	By region and tier, shown during the application	Five-step application, including instructor approval	No term given on the program page

Other UK accreditors exist, such as The CPD Group, which accredits individual activities. The CPD Certification Service, established in 1996, says it has assessed “over 40,000 CPD courses and events”, has members in “over 100 countries”, and issues “over 500,000 CPD delegate certificates” a year. Its international membership means a provider in Ireland, Australia or Canada can use a UK accreditor, but check first that the professional bodies your learners belong to recognize the mark.

What it costs

In the UK you will only know after a conversation: The CPD Certification Service and The CPD Standards Office price by the number of courses or events and quote after a consultation. For a sense of scale, The CPD Register publishes typical ranges for the market: per course “£150-£500” at the budget end, “£500-£1,500” mid-range and “£1,500-£3,000+” for premium or specialist accreditors, annual memberships of “£200-£1,000+”, and “£2-£10 per certificate” at some bodies. Those are its figures, not any accreditor’s price list, and bear in mind that The CPD Register sells certification to accreditors.

IACET publishes its 2026 fees in full:

IACET fee (2026)	Amount
Standard and initial application bundle	$495
Initial application review	$4,845
Annual maintenance, first year collected with the application	$1,245
First year in total	$6,585
Each later year	$1,245
Reaccreditation review, after five years	$3,695
Expedited initial review, optional	$1,845

The bigger cost is often your own time. Every route asks for course materials, learning outcomes, hours and evaluation. IACET also asks for policies and evidence across the organization, checked at an interview, while IOSH sets requirements for trainers and CITB for quality systems and insurance.

Test demand before you pay

Accreditation is worth paying for when it changes what clients buy or what they pay. Check that before you apply.

• Ask your clients. Put the question to two or three corporate buyers and regular learners: would an accredited version change whether they book, or what they would pay?
• Look at your rivals. Are the equivalent courses in your market accredited, by whom, and at what price compared with unaccredited ones?
• Check the professional bodies. Do the bodies your learners belong to list or recommend accredited providers, or leave the choice to members?
• Check where buyers search. Do learners in your sector find courses through a directory, such as CITB’s Construction Training Directory or an accreditor’s own course listings?

Then put the numbers into the calculator. It compares the yearly cost, including your time, with what accreditation adds: a higher price on the places you already sell, and bookings it wins that you would not otherwise get.

Does accreditation pay for itself?

$ £ € A$

Fees a year Membership, course fees, renewals

Your hours a year Preparing, submitting, keeping records

Value of your hour What else that time would earn

Places sold a year On the accredited courses

Price per place Average, per learner

Extra per place What accreditation lets you add; test it first

Extra places a year Bookings you would not otherwise win

$3,000 costs a year, including your time

$4,760 extra revenue a year

$1,760 Pays for itself · break-even at $13 more per place, before extra bookings

Which courses are worth accrediting

Accreditation pays most when your buyers are professionals and the companies that employ them: in-house training for a client’s HR or finance team, open courses that professionals expense, and conferences where the CPD hours are part of the reason to attend. It pays least for courses people take for interest, and for qualifications where the awarding body’s name already does the work. Start with one or two courses that sell to professionals, see whether the mark changes your conversion or price, and add courses from there.

Questions to ask an accreditor before you pay

Most UK accreditors quote after a call, so the call is where you get the facts. Ask each one the same questions and compare the answers in writing.

• Is the accreditation for each course, or for our organization? How is the price worked out?
• What is the full cost in the first year, and what does renewal cost? Are there fees per certificate, per extra course or for changes to a course?
• How long does the review take, and is there a paid fast track?
• Which professional bodies’ members use your mark to record their CPD? Can you name some?
• What do you need from us: materials, learning outcomes, hours, trainer profiles, evaluation?
• Where can we use the mark, and what happens to certificates already issued if our membership lapses?
• Do you check providers after approval, and which records do you ask to see?
• Do you list accredited courses in a directory that learners search?
• Is your organization certified or reviewed by anyone, and do you publish your prices and complaints policy?

How to prepare before you apply

Every route reviews roughly the same things, so preparing once serves all of them.

Learning outcomes. Write what a learner will be able to do after each part of the course. The CPD Certification Service asks for “the key learning objectives and outcomes”, and RICS defines formal CPD by “clear learning objectives and outcomes”.

Accurate hours. Count active learning only. The CPD Certification Service defines CPD hours as “the time spent for a delegate to be in ‘active learning’”, and its example is a 9:00 to 5:00 day with an hour for lunch, which is seven hours. SHRM counts “actual educational time spent”, in quarter-hour steps, without lunch and breaks.

Materials. Have your slides, handouts and course notes ready to send. The CPD Certification Service says submissions “usually will include presentation slides, handouts, and any additional training course notes”.

Evaluation. Have an end-of-course feedback form, and read the answers. How to Evaluate Training has questions that tell you something.

Certificates. Each learner needs a certificate showing the course, the date, the hours or points and a unique reference. Training Certificates and CPD has a template.

Records. Keep attendance, assessment results and certificates for each learner, so you can show how each certificate was earned. IACET’s interview exists to verify the information in the application, and CITB visits its members within three months.

Trainers. IOSH sets trainer requirements, SHRM asks that instructors have “credentials or professional experience”, and PMI approves Authorized Training Partner instructors before they teach. Keep a short profile for each trainer, with qualifications and experience.

Insurance and systems. CITB’s Training Provider Network requires a quality management system and set levels of insurance. Check what your route asks for, and have the documents to hand, before you apply.

After you are accredited

Use the mark only where it applies. The CPD Certification Service’s “CPD Certified” symbol can be used on “the accredited training course materials, as well as certificates of attendance”, and The CPD Standards Office’s trustmark, with your membership number, on “the accredited training activities materials, websites, social media”. Neither covers courses that have not been accredited, so keep the mark off them, including in your course listings.

Put the CPD on the certificate. Learners need the hours or points, the date and a way to check the certificate when they record their CPD or face an audit. The HCPC audits “a random sample of each profession at every renewal”, IOSH selects “a sample of members” for CPD audits, and the CIPD audits members’ CPD each year.

Keep courses and renewals current. Accreditation covers the course as it was reviewed. When you change a course substantially, tell the accreditor, and renew before the membership lapses, so no certificate goes out under a mark you no longer hold.

Tell buyers what it means. On the course page, say which body accredited the course, how many hours or points it carries, and that it is structured learning with stated outcomes. A line such as “6 CPD hours of structured learning, accredited by [body]” answers the question a professional has.

Mistakes to avoid

• Calling your business “CPD accredited” when only some courses are.
• Counting breaks and lunch as CPD hours.
• Presenting CPD accreditation as a qualification, or as approval from a learner’s own professional body.
• Buying a general CPD mark when your sector or your learners’ profession has its own provider route.
• Paying an accreditor without checking who they are, what they charge each year and which bodies’ members use their mark.
• Issuing certificates without the hours, a date or a reference, so learners cannot use them.

Frequently asked questions

What is CPD accreditation? An independent review of a course or a provider against an accrediting body’s standard. If it meets the standard, the provider can present the course as accredited CPD, show the body’s mark and state the hours or points learners can record.

Is CPD accreditation a legal requirement for training providers? No. It is voluntary. Professional bodies set their members’ CPD requirements, and most, such as the NMC, the HCPC and the Law Society of Ireland, do not approve or accredit CPD providers.

Is CPD accreditation regulated? In the UK, no government body regulates it. Accreditors are independent organizations with their own criteria and prices. The CPD Register, which certifies accreditors, calls the sector “completely unregulated”, so ask any accreditor how it is reviewed and whether it publishes its prices.

How much does CPD accreditation cost? The main UK accreditors quote after a consultation, based on how many courses or events you want accredited. The CPD Register’s published market ranges run from about £150 to over £3,000 per course, depending on the accreditor. IACET in the US publishes its fees: $6,585 for the first year in 2026, then $1,245 a year.

How long does CPD accreditation take? The CPD Certification Service says the process “typically takes 10-14 working days”, and The CPD Standards Office up to 30 days, or 14 days for an extra fee. CITB reviews Training Provider Network applications within 10 working days. IACET’s review generally takes three to four months.

Do professional bodies require CPD to be accredited? Most set hours or outcomes and ask members to record relevant learning, with evidence, without requiring it to be accredited. SHRM and PMI are exceptions, with their own provider programs whose credits count directly.

What is the difference between CPD points and CPD hours? For The CPD Certification Service they are the same: one CPD point equals one hour of active learning. Other bodies use their own units, such as CEUs, where one CEU equals ten contact hours.

Can I accredit just one course? Yes, with the UK CPD accreditors, which accredit individual courses and events. IACET, SHRM and PMI approve the organization rather than individual courses.

Can I offer CPD hours without accreditation? Yes, as long as you do not imply the course is accredited. Most professional bodies accept relevant learning whether or not an accreditor has reviewed it: the NMC does not prescribe any type of CPD, and the HCPC does not approve CPD activities. A certificate with the hours, date and learning outcomes is useful on its own; just leave off any accreditor’s mark and the word “accredited”.

Can I use the CPD logo on all my courses? No. The marks apply to the courses and events that were accredited, and their materials and certificates.

Can a provider outside the UK get CPD accreditation? Yes. The CPD Certification Service says it has members in over 100 countries, and IACET accredits organizations; check its eligibility rules for yours. Either way, confirm first that the professional bodies your learners belong to recognize the mark.

Sources

Every figure and quote above comes from these pages, checked November 6, 2026 on the publishers’ own sites.

Show all 32 sources

• The CPD Certification Service, How much does it cost to become a CPD provider?
• The CPD Certification Service, The process of gaining accreditation for training courses
• The CPD Certification Service, What is The CPD Delegate Certificate Service?
• The CPD Standards Office, Cost of CPD accreditation
• The CPD Standards Office, How the process works
• The CPD Register, How to choose a CPD accreditation provider
• The CPD Register, What does CPD accreditation mean?
• The CPD Register, The CPD Group certification overview
• IACET, Becoming an IACET Accredited Provider
• IACET, Upcoming fee increase effective January 1, 2026
• IACET, Frequently asked questions
• IACET, About the CEU
• SHRM, Recertification Provider Program Guide 2025
• SHRM, Recertification Provider Program requirements
• PMI, Become a PMI Authorized Training Partner
• IOSH, Deliver IOSH courses
• IOSH, Get your course IOSH approved
• IOSH, CPD for members
• CITB, Existing ATOs
• CITB, How to become a TPN member
• CITB, Short course grants
• RICS, CPD requirements and obligations
• CIPD, CPD policy
• HCPC, Our CPD requirements
• NMC, Revalidation: CPD
• SRA, Continuing competence FAQs
• Law Society of Ireland, Information for CPD providers
• Law Society of Ireland, 2024–26 CPD scheme record card
• Engineers Ireland, Record my CPD
• CPA Ontario, Continuing professional development
• CPA Australia, Continuing professional development
• Engineers Australia, CPD requirements