The Rhode Island Surplus Line Broker license

27-3-38(a) says the commissioner may issue the license to any person and then adds the one bar that matters, "Residents of this state must hold an insurance producer license to qualify for a surplus lines broker license". No examination appears anywhere in the section and Pearson publishes no Rhode Island surplus lines paper. The Department’s own page and its fee regulation do not say quite the same thing, and the regulation is the narrower of the two. The page says a resident applicant needs an active insurance producer license and that there is no bond requirement; 230-RICR-20-50-5 5.4(B)(4)(b) says the producer license must carry property and casualty lines of authority, and that the surplus lines fee is paid on top of the producer fee rather than instead of it. Both are current and the regulation is the one an applicant should plan against. The fee is $100 biennially for residents and non-residents alike, built out of the $50 a year that 27-3-42 sets. Two things then shape the license rather than the application. 27-3-38(c) requires affidavits from both the licensee and the insured on each placement, showing that no fewer than three admitted insurers were tried without success, and then exempts a list of interests from the affidavit that runs from amusement parks to railroad liability. And the renewal is not the Department’s alone: it works directly with the Division of Taxation for clearance on every renewal, and clearance comes only when all taxes have been filed.

Read at webserver.rilegislature.gov on 2026-08-18