Getting an insurance license in West Virginia
West Virginia licenses through the West Virginia Offices of the Insurance Commissioner, which calls the licensee an agent. Which license you need depends on what you intend to sell, and the requirements differ sharply between them.
License types
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Accident and Health or Sickness
Sells cover for sickness, bodily injury or accidental death in West Virginia. A program of insurance education comes before the examination and the Code sets no hour count for it.
No count
4 courses from $79.95
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Car Rental
The cover offered alongside a rental car in West Virginia. The Commissioner's own table of required examinations records this line as a limited line with no examination required, and the approved program of study is presented at the test center, so there is nothing to sit and nothing to sit it for.
No course
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Casualty
Sells cover against legal liability in West Virginia. The Commissioner's own handbook notes that the Surety limited line is included in this one. A program of insurance education comes before the examination.
No count
5 courses from $79.95
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Company Adjuster
Investigates, negotiates or settles property, casualty or workers compensation claims in West Virginia as a staff employee of an insurance company, paid by the insurer. Three lines of authority, no pre-licensing course, and eight attempts at the examination in a lifetime.
No course
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Credit
Credit insurance sold alongside an extension of credit in West Virginia. The one instruction requirement attached to it is 33-12-6(d), which falls on the insurer rather than on the applicant. The Commissioner's own table of required examinations records this line as a limited line with no examination required, and the approved program of study is presented at the test center, so there is nothing to sit and nothing to sit it for.
No course
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Crop
Crop insurance in West Virginia. The Commissioner's table adds that it is included with Property and Casualty, and it is the one line a college insurance degree does not waive the examination for, which costs nothing because there is no examination to waive. The Commissioner's own table of required examinations records this line as a limited line with no examination required, and the approved program of study is presented at the test center, so there is nothing to sit and nothing to sit it for.
No course
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Emergency Adjuster
A ninety day company or independent adjuster license issued in a declared insurance emergency. The insurer applies, not the adjuster, and the qualification is being otherwise qualified somewhere else.
No course
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Independent Adjuster
Investigates, negotiates or settles property, casualty or workers compensation claims in West Virginia as an independent contractor, or an employee of one, contracting for compensation with insurers or self-insurers. Three lines of authority, no pre-licensing course, and eight attempts at the examination in a lifetime.
No course
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Life
Sells life insurance in West Virginia. This is one of the few states left that asks a course before the examination, and the Code delegates its length to the Board of Insurance Agent Education rather than fixing one.
No count
4 courses from $79.95
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Personal Lines
Property and casualty insurance sold to individuals and families for primarily noncommercial purposes in West Virginia. A program of insurance education comes before the examination, and no designation waiver reaches this line: the Commissioner's list names the Property and Casualty lines of authority and does not name this one.
No count
5 courses from $109.95
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Professional Bail Bondsman
Writes bail bonds on your own security rather than an insurer’s. Cash, a letter of credit, an annuity, a financial guarantee bond or real estate pledged to the Commissioner, and a bonding fee the statute sets a floor under.
No course
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Property
Sells cover for direct or consequential loss or damage to property of every kind in West Virginia. A program of insurance education comes before the examination and the Code sets no hour count for it.
No count
5 courses from $79.95
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Public Adjuster
Acts for the insured rather than the insurer, on first party property claims only. West Virginia lets the same person hold this and a company or independent adjuster license at once, and then forbids using both on one claim.
No course
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Self Storage
Cover for the contents of a rented storage unit in West Virginia. The Commissioner's own table of required examinations records this line as a limited line with no examination required, and the approved program of study is presented at the test center, so there is nothing to sit and nothing to sit it for.
No course
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Surety Bail Bondsman
Writes bail bonds backed by an insurer. It stacks on a producer license, and which producer line you choose decides whether you sit twenty hours of pre-licensing education or none.
20 hrs
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Surety
Surety in West Virginia. The Commissioner's table adds that it is included in the Casualty examination, so somebody sitting Casualty has already covered it. The Commissioner's own table of required examinations records this line as a limited line with no examination required, and the approved program of study is presented at the test center, so there is nothing to sit and nothing to sit it for.
No course
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Surplus Lines
Places business with insurers West Virginia has not admitted. It is the one line here the Commissioner excuses from pre-licensing education outright, and the one that asks for years instead: three consecutive years of property and casualty sales immediately before applying, one of them as a licensed West Virginia agent.
No course
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Title
Title insurance in West Virginia. The Commissioner's own table of required examinations records this line as a limited line with no examination required, and the approved program of study is presented at the test center, so there is nothing to sit and nothing to sit it for.
No course
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Travel
Travel insurance in West Virginia. The Commissioner's own table of required examinations records this line as a limited line with no examination required, and the approved program of study is presented at the test center, so there is nothing to sit and nothing to sit it for.
No course
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Variable Life and Annuities
Sells variable life insurance and variable annuities in West Virginia. The Commissioner sets no examination of its own for it: the handbook's table of required examinations names the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority Series 6 or Series 7 and says in terms that it is not an Offices exam.
No course
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Viatical Settlement Broker
Negotiates viatical settlement contracts for the policy owner. West Virginia examines it, and a life producer doing it incidentally needs no license at all.
No course
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Viatical Settlement Provider
Buys life insurance policies from their owners. A plan of operation, an anti-fraud plan and $250,000 behind it, and no examination: the Department’s licensing page names only the broker, and the statute grants both.
No course
Is a course required?
West Virginia requires pre-licensing education for Life, Accident and Health or Sickness, Property and Casualty, Personal Lines . No hour count is published with it, and the note below says what that means here.
A course is required and the certificate has to be handed to the test center before the exam can be sat, on the Commissioner's own PL 789E form or the provider's certificate. A designation such as CIC or CPCU, or a college insurance degree, replaces the EXAMINATION and not the course: the Commissioner's candidate handbook puts both under a heading reading "Waiver of examination" and lists the approved program of study as a separate numbered requirement in the same eligibility list. An earlier reading here said it replaced the course, which the handbook does not say. The hour count is not published because the Legislature did not set one. The duty is at 33-12-6(a)(9) rather than at 33-12-7, which is the Board's own section and is machinery: under 33-12-7(b) the Commissioner and the Board may approve a course that presents "the criteria and the number of hours that the board and commissioner determine appropriate", so the number is delegated to the Board rather than fixed in the Code. That the requirement exists at all is confirmed by 33-12-14, which exempts a producer transferring from another state from "any prelicensing education or examination". Recorded as null rather than guessed.
Read at the Department on 2026-08-16 . West Virginia Code 33-12-6(a)(9), which requires a program of insurance education of every agent first licensed on or after July 1, 1989, with 33-12-7 delegating its length to the Board of Insurance Agent Education, and 33-12-14 for the transfer exemption
West Virginia requires no pre-licensing course for Surplus Lines, Company Adjuster, Independent Adjuster, Public Adjuster, Emergency Adjuster, Professional Bail Bonds, Surety Bail Bonds.
The candidate handbook says it in four words, "Pre-licensing education is not required of adjusters", and again for the other two: pre-licensing education is not required of surplus lines candidates, and there is no pre-licensing or continuing education for bail bonds. The statute stands behind the adjuster half of that. 33-12B-5(a) is a closed list of seven findings the commissioner must make and no course is in it, and the education provisions of the chapter, at 33-12B-13, are continuing education only. Read against the statute on 2026-08-19, having been read off the handbook alone before that. The surety bail bondsman is the one to watch, because it is a zero that can turn into forty hours: the license stacks on a producer license, and an applicant who chooses the property and casualty line rather than the limited lines surety line takes West Virginia’s twenty hours per line.
Read at code.wvlegislature.gov on 2026-08-19 . W. Va. Code 33-12B-5
West Virginia requires no pre-licensing course for Viatical settlement broker, Viatical settlement provider.
33-13C-3(d) is one investigation covering both licenses, six findings, and no course or hour count anywhere in the article. What stands in front of them instead is money: a minimum equity of $250,000 in audited statements or a $250,000 surety bond, which a broker alone may replace, at the commissioner’s discretion, with professional liability cover of $100,000 per occurrence and $300,000 in the aggregate. The broker also sits an examination of its own and the provider does not.
Read at code.wvlegislature.gov on 2026-08-19 . W. Va. Code 33-13C-3
Fees
| Charge | Paid to | Amount |
|---|---|---|
| Resident agent license West Virginia charges $50 for a resident agent license whatever lines it carries. It is scoped to the surplus lines license as well, because that one is a line added to a producer license and the $200 below is charged on top of this $50 rather than instead of it. | West Virginia Insurance Commissioner | $50.00 |
| Surplus lines license | West Virginia Insurance Commissioner | $200.00 |
| Adjuster license, individual Annual under 33-12B-8(a), which the Department states as $50 renewing every two years on the licensee’s birth month. The same figure covers a company, independent or public adjuster license, and an emergency adjuster license costs the same. | West Virginia Insurance Commissioner | $25.00 |
| Adjuster license, business entity Annual under 33-12B-8(b), eight times the individual license, and only an independent or public adjuster may be licensed as a business entity. It is an alternative to the individual row rather than a charge beside it, so it is scoped to nothing and no cost page totals it. | West Virginia Insurance Commissioner | $200.00 |
| Adjuster examination fee Non-refundable, payable to the commissioner under 33-12B-5(b)(2) for each examination, and charged on top of whatever the testing service charges for the sitting itself. | West Virginia Insurance Commissioner | $25.00 |
| Fingerprinting through IdentoGo $12.50 for the print, $20.00 to the West Virginia State Police and $13.25 to the FBI. Prints are valid 60 days. An adjuster is fingerprinted when adding a new adjuster license type or a new line of authority but not on renewal; a bail bondsman is fingerprinted at initial application and again at every renewal. | IdentoGo, the West Virginia State Police and the FBI | $45.75 |
| Viatical settlement provider license fee Searched and not published, and the statute says why. W. Va. Code 33-13C-3 makes the application "accompanied by fees established in legislative rules, including emergency rules, promulgated by the commissioner", so the figure is in the rules rather than in the Code and the Code will never carry it. What the section does set is the money a provider must have rather than pay: a minimum equity of not less than $250,000 in cash or cash equivalents in audited financial statements, or a $250,000 surety bond, plus errors and omissions cover of not less than $100,000 per occurrence and $300,000 in the aggregate. Those are security and cover rather than payments and no cost page totals them. | West Virginia Offices of the Insurance Commissioner | Not confirmed |
Every amount above was read at its own source between 2026-08-13 and 2026-09-05. Exam and fingerprint charges go to a vendor, not to the Department, and say so.
Approved courses
West Virginia's register is Sircon's Compliance Express, which the Offices link from their own Licensing division page as "List of Pre-Licensing Schools". It names COURSES, not just schools: Approved Courses Inquiry, State of West Virginia, Education Type set to Pre-Licensing Education with every course category ticked, returns 15 providers and 88 courses, each with a course number, a credit count, a category, a delivery method, an active date and a renewal date. The whole of it as read on 2026-08-16 is in src/data/generated/wv-approvals.json. Two things to know before running it. The frameset rejects a user agent it cannot parse a version out of and answers with a browser-upgrade page rather than the register, so a truncated agent string reads as a dead end. And the register is the only place West Virginia's hour count appears at all: every approved single-line course carries 20 credits and every combined one 40, from all fifteen providers. That is what the Board has approved rather than a figure the Board publishes as a requirement, which is why the mandate above stays null. The same page also carries the Offices' notice that a pre-licensing certificate is valid for six months from the date of completion. You can search it at sircon.com .