The New Mexico Bail Bondsman license
Bail Bondsman
Writes bail bonds in New Mexico. Ten clock hours, where a clock hour is fifty minutes rather than sixty.
Course
40 hrs
The shortest single course route.
Ways in
2
Every one of them requires the state exam.
Exam
$75
Required.
Every way to qualify
More than one route leads to this license, and which one you take changes what you study and whether you sit the exam. They are listed in full because the course is only the first of them.
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Route 1 Take the 10 classroom hours and the 30 hours of on-the-job training
State exam required
Pre-licensing classroom education
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10 hours of pre-licensing classroom education for the Bail Bondsman line, on a curriculum the superintendent has approved, approved by the Department. 10 of those hours cannot be taken at your own pace, so a fully self-paced online course does not satisfy this on its own. The route's own note says which live formats the state accepts
and on-the-job training
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30 hours of on-the-job training under the direct supervision of a sponsoring bail bondsman, on a plan filed with the superintendent each January, approved by the Department
Ten clock hours of formal classroom education, and the superintendent defines a clock hour as fifty minutes of continuous instruction rather than sixty. The ten hours are not the whole of it: 13.20.2.12 NMAC adds thirty clock hours of on-the-job training under a sponsoring bail bondsman, and 13.20.2.14 NMAC says an applicant may not sit the examination until both are done. So the real figure a reader is buying against is forty hours, only ten of which anybody sells. The classroom half has to be offered in at least two parts of the state a hundred and fifty driving miles apart, which is a rule about access rather than content and is unique here.
Read at srca.nm.gov on 2026-08-16
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Route 2 Ask the superintendent to waive the education on your background
State exam required
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Background and experience the superintendent considers sufficient to warrant waiving the pre-licensing education, on written request
13.20.2.13 NMAC: "Upon written request from an applicant, the superintendent may, at his discretion, waive the pre-licensing education requirements whenever the applicant's background and experience so warrant."May and at his discretion, with no test written down and no period set, so it is a request rather than a qualification. It reaches the education, classroom and on-the-job training alike, and not the examination, which 13.20.2.14 NMAC still requires.
Read at srca.nm.gov on 2026-08-16
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A course is required and nobody sells one
New Mexico accredits who may teach the ten hours and publishes no register of them, and the thirty hours of on-the-job training under a sponsoring bondsman's filed plan cannot be bought at all. No national seller prices a New Mexico bail product.