NIPR and Sircon
Somewhere between passing the exam and holding the license, a state stops talking about itself and starts talking about one of these. Neither is a government agency. Both take your application and your money, and which one you deal with is decided by the state, not by you.
What each one actually is
| NIPR | Sircon | |
|---|---|---|
| Full name | National Insurance Producer Registry | Sircon Corporation |
| What it says it is | "a not-for-profit technology company that provides cost-effective, streamlined, and uniform licensing data and compliance services for insurance professionals" | "Sircon, powered by Vertafore, provides resources and solutions to every stakeholder through the Sircon Connected Network" |
| Who owns it | Not-for-profit. It describes working "together with the NAIC and the insurance industry", the NAIC being the association the state insurance regulators belong to. | A commercial company. In its own words, "Sircon Corporation is a subsidiary of Vertafore, Inc." |
| Read on | nipr.com read 2026-08-14 | sircon.com read 2026-08-14 |
The choice is not yours to make
The question people arrive with is which one to use. Usually there is nothing to decide: the department names the system it wants in its own filing instructions, and using the other one is not an option it offers. Where a state names both, it says so.
Colorado names both
Colorado tells an applicant the fee may be filed through either. That is the exception rather than the pattern.
States whose instructions we have read name NIPR
And these name Sircon
These lists are drawn from the state records on this site and say only what those records say. A state on neither list is one whose notes here do not name a system. It is not a state that uses neither, and you should read its own instructions rather than infer anything from its absence.
What this changes about the money
Very little, and that is worth saying plainly. The license fee is the state's and does not move because of which system collects it. What can move is a transaction fee on top, so the figure on your card may be a little larger than the figure on the state's fee schedule.
Every fee this site publishes is the amount the department states, read at the department. If you are reconciling a card statement against one of our state pages and it is a few dollars over, that gap is the filing system's, not the regulator's.