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Frequently Asked Questions

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Department of Health FAQ's

General

Will I receive notification my approved status is about to end?

A message will appear in your Communication Center informing you of upcoming expiration dates. All users on the account will also receive an email reminder. Reminders are sent at monthly intervals beginning 120 days in advance.

Will the attachments I submit electronically be viewed by the public?

No. Attachments are routed directly to the respective Board.

How will the Board contact us if they need more information concerning our application?

The Board will send an electronic message to your organization's Primary Contact. This request will be sent to both the Primary Contact's CE Broker Message Box and e-mail address.

Is there a fee to become a CE Provider?

Each Board sets its own fee to become/renew as an approved educational provider. CE Broker collects this fee and remits it directly to the applicable Board.

How long does an educational provider remain approved?

The renewal periods for educational providers often coincide with the respective license renewal period.

When can I renew with a Board?

Generally, you may renew within 120 days of the next biennium. You will want to renew prior to your approved provider expiration date to avoid having to re-submit the initial application.

Primary Contact

Educational Providers are required to designate a Primary Contact. The same Primary Contact will represent your company with each Board to which you apply.

What are the responsibilities of the primary contact? The CE Broker Primary Contact may allow others within your organization to access CE Broker. The CE Broker Primary Contact may add additional System Users, create Secure Access Groups, and then assign Users to these Secure Access Groups.

The Board Primary Contact is responsible to the Board for ensuring their company complies with all applicable rules, guidelines, and procedures.

How can we change our primary contact? To change the person who represents your company as Primary Contact, simply access the organizational profile and make the necessary change. Each Board for which your company is an Approved Educational Provider (or has an application pending) will receive notification of your change.

How many people in my organization may have access to the system?

Each educational provider has one CE Broker Primary Contact and as many System Users as desired.

Secure Access Groups provide a method to manage the ways a System User may view or modify the data contained in their organization`s portion of CE Broker. A User only has the system rights granted for the Secure Access Group to which he or she is assigned.

When a Licensee has a question concerning my organization, one of our courses, or the posting of hours on a course he/she completed, to whom is the message routed?

You can route each type of message to different people within your organization, if you wish. To view the routing setup click the View Routing Set-up link from your welcome page.

What payment methods does CE Broker accept?

CE Broker accepts Visa and MasterCard. In addition to credit cards, CE Broker also accepts checks and e-checks.

Is my application fee refundable?

The appropriate application fee will be charged for each Regulatory Board. This fee is non-refundable regardless of the approval or non-approval of the application.

How does CE Broker know who is licensed?

CE Broker is integrated with the Department of Health licensing system. The weekly integration means CE Broker knows within one week that a new licensee has been added or that a current license has been updated.

Does CE Broker calculate whether continuing education license renewal requirements are met?

CE Broker posts qualifying course completion credit reported to the records of licensees. Based on the hours reported, and the continuing education requirements established by the Board, CE Broker calculates whether continuing education renewal requirements are met dynamically for each professional license. The Department`s licensing system can, at any time, retrieve a simple "yes" or "no" determination or extract the entire continuing education history from CE Broker.

Can my company view whether a licensee's continuing education renewal requirements have been met?

Yes. As an employer you may also view your employee's continuing education transcript and chronological course history by registering for Employer Services. For more details contact the CE Broker Helpdesk 877-434-6323.

Can I mail in a paper application?

No. CE Broker streamlines continuing education processes. Integrated within CE Broker are electronic workflows enabling 100% paperless processing among educational providers, Regulating Boards, and the Department of Health. Educational providers are required to apply online via CE Broker.

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Course

Does each of my courses need to be in the system?

Course completion credit may only be submitted for courses in the system. Courses that have been successfully added to the CE Broker system will have been accepted by the applicable Regulatory Boards. The course detail determines the number of continuing education renewal hours and the profession to which the course will apply.

With the CE Broker system, the course is entered once; then, any number of rosters with any number of participants is attached to the course. Licensees will receive credit based on the course approval. Even if the course does not count toward a compliance requirement for the participant, the course will post to his or her chronological course history.

How long does it take to get a course accepted?

Depending on the Regulating Board, the acceptance may be immediate, following a quarterly Board meeting, or any time in the interim.

How far in advance do I need to enter my course in CE Broker?

Most Boards recommend that courses requiring a decision are submitted 30 days in advance, however, this may vary by individual Board policy. CE Broker has no system requirement for course addition. If a Board does not require that courses are approved, you may enter them into CE Broker at any time.

Our courses are provided both online and in a classroom setting. How can we register both delivery methods?

If your course is provided via two different delivery methods then, the course will need to be added to the system twice. For each course addition, you will need to assign one course type and delivery method. The same title can be used for both courses but the Course Tracking # assigned to each will be unique.

Can I change a course once I`ve submitted the course?

While a course is pending acceptance by a Regulating Board, you may edit the course name, course description, renewal hours and professions. Once accepted, only the description field may be edited.

When will I hear from the Board about my Course application?

The Board decision on your application may be instantaneous, take months, or occur anytime in the interim. If your application is deficient in any way and more information is required, you'll receive a Request for Additional Information from the Board within 30 days. Once the application is deemed complete (all information has been received and deficiencies remedied), you may expect a decision from the Board within 30 days. Note: If you receive a Request for Additional Information, be sure to respond in full as this will most likely be your only opportunity to make this submission complete. Once a decision is made, you will receive a message in your Communication Center as well as an email notification.

Who will receive notification of course approvals?

Once a course is accepted by a Board, the user who submitted the Course Addition will receive a message in their Communication Center on the CE Broker website and a standard e-mail notifying him/her the course has been accepted by the Board.

How do I know if a Board has requested additional information from me concerning a course?

Should a Board require additional information, a message will be sent to the user who submitted the Course Addition. The request will be sent to the user's CE Broker Message Box and to the user's e-mail address.

Do I enter a course for each Board even though it is the same course?

No. You will only need to enter the information for each course once. You may then apply to multiple Boards with the one course submission. CE Broker electronically routes your course information (including file attachments) to all applicable Boards and does not make any eligibility determinations.

What if all the information I need to submit for course acceptance is not available in electronic format?

The file attachment process allows all documents to be transferred electronically through CE Broker, eliminating the time needed for mail delivery.

We now offer a course online that we previously held in a classroom. How can we change the delivery method?

Instead of changing the delivery method, you will need to add a new course. The same title can be used for both courses but the Course Tracking # assigned to each will be unique. If you will no longer offer the classroom version, then set that course to inactive status.

How long does a course remain accepted?

Depending on the Regulating Board, the course may expire two (2) years from the date accepted, at the same time as your renewal, or another specified time. It may be your course will not have an expiration date at all. Should your course need to be resubmitted for Board approval, you may resubmit online.

My course is now worth more (or less) hours than originally submitted. How do I update?

To change the hours of a course already accepted by any Board, inactivate the course and add a new course with the corrected amount of hours.

We are no longer going to offer a course. How do we delete it from the system?

To remove a course from the listing of those available, change its status to inactive by clicking the active check box and removing the checkmark. A course is never really deleted from the system. For archival purposes, all courses are retained via their course tracking number and status.

You may reactivate a course and bring it back from inactive.

Who notifies licensees if a course has changed in any way?

Notification of course changes to licensees will continue to be the responsibility of the educational provider.

I offer a course with two different delivery methods. How would I submit the course in the system?

If you offer a course that has both a classroom and home study version, it would be two separate courses. This is true even though the content covered in both courses is the same. These are two separate courses as you have more than one delivery method for licensees to choose.

If you have one course that has both a classroom and home study portions, the answer differs based on the Board.

  1. Massage Therapy, Nursing Home Administrators, Respiratory Care, Osteopathic Medicine
    Two different delivery methods would be two different courses. "Blended learning" is not an option for these Boards.
    For the Board of Nursing Home Administrators, please refer to Rule 64B10-15.002(5), Florida Administrative Code.

  2. All other Florida Department of Health Boards

    If you have one course that has both classroom and home study portions and you only issue one course certificate
    when both portions are complete, most professions consider this one "blended learning" course. The Florida Department of Health Boards - with the exception of those listed above - define a "live" course type as having the "opportunity for interaction" with an instructor.

    An example is the 20-hour course where the educational provider only issues a completed course certificate when the
    course is completed in full. Should an educational provider offer this course as 12 hours home study followed by 8
    classroom hours, the full 20 hour course would be submitted as "live" as all content covered by the course has "opportunity for interaction" with a qualified instructor.

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Publishing

What is a publishing?

Publishings are how rosters are associated to courses. Live courses are published for each date, time, and location. Anytime courses are published once. The publishings are how rosters are categorized.

Why publish a course?

There are two reasons to publish a course. First, publishings categorize rosters and make them easily searchable. Second, publishing allows licensees to search for courses by date, time, and location.

How many times can I publish a course?

"Anytime" courses only need to be published one time. Publish "live" courses as many times as you are offering the course.

Will I be prevented from publishing a course that has not been approved?

Yes. If a course requires approval, the system will not allow it to be published until the course is accepted by the Board.

The dates for a course I want to publish extend beyond my current educational provider eligibility time span. What do I do?

If the dates for the course extend beyond the current educational provider eligibility time span, the date displayed to the licensees will reflect the following message "pending renewal for this period". Renewing with the Board may be performed online. Depending on the Board, there may be a cost to renew as an educational provider.

How can we change the date on a publishing?

The Date(s), Day of the Week, and Time may not be modified. If a rescheduling has occurred, set this published course to inactive and republish the course with the new information.

How can we change the location of a publishing?

Click "Information Update / Additions" on the menu bar and then select "Published Courses" in the dropdown menu, or click the link from your welcome page to View Existing Course Publishings. You will have a number of search alternatives available to locate your published courses. After locating the course publication in question, click on the date to view the detail and update the location. The location must be entered on your account before you can add it to a course publication.

What happens to publishings when I inactivate a location?

If the publishing is active, the system will not allow you to set the location to inactive. To set the location to inactive, first set all course publishings using the location to inactive.

How can I delete a location? How soon does the deletion take effect?

A location is never really deleted from the system. For archival purposes, all locations are retained via their location tracking number. To inactivate a location from the listing of available locations, change the location's status to inactive by clicking the active check box to remove the checkmark.

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Completed Course Credit

What are my course completion credit submission options?

There are many options. To view the options for submitting course completion information, click here.

How soon after I submit completed course credit can a licensee view what was submitted?

CE Broker processes rosters overnight. Licensees may then view the credits posted to their transcript and chronological course history.

How will I know if the completed course credit I submitted was processed?

For each entry on the roster there will be an "S" in the status field when the roster has been successfully processed. To view your online roster, go to your "Roster History", click on search to bring up a list of your rosters and select the publishing tracking number of the course roster you want to view.

How long do I have to submit course completions?

All credit should be fully submitted no more than thirty (30) calendar days following completion of the course by the licensee(s).

Does the license number include the alpha prefix?

Yes, the license number will include both the alpha and numeric portions.

What if the licensee gives us the wrong license number?

You may wish to contact the licensee or research the correct license number on the Department of Health website.

Neither is required if you've already made a good faith effort to submit properly.

Can I export information from my organization's student registration system to CE Broker?

Yes. To submit completed continuing education course credit, educational providers need not be integrated with CE Broker. By converting the course registration data into the format expected by CE Broker, the course completion credit data may be transmitted electronically. All imported data from educational providers must then be uploaded via CE Broker, traveling through the firewall to protect the integrity of the system.

I submitted course completion credit to the wrong licensee account. How do I correct it?

If you used the wrong licensee license number and the entry was successfully posted to that licensee as opposed to the one who should have received the credit, please send a message to the CE Broker helpdesk by clicking the "Contact CE Broker" links from within your account or from our homepage.

I received a message from a licensee that a course they attended has not posted to their record. What should I do?

Your roster may be accessed online. Select Course Completion in the navigation bar and then click on Roster History in the dropdown menu. Enter the publishing tracking number for the course the licensee attended. View the roster and note whether the licensee successfully posted or not. If not successfully posted, make the necessary corrections and resubmit.

Do I need to issue course completion certificates?

The certificate requirement is specific to each Board. You will want to view the laws & rules for the specific Board to review their certificate requirements.

If a completed course credit submission has been rejected, in part or in whole, how do I resubmit the information?

You may access your rejections by going to the Course Credit Rejection Worksheet in the Communication Center.

You may correct the roster by clicking on the course name and making the change on the roster and clicking submit. If there are no rejections, the roster will not appear in the Course Credit Rejection Worksheet tab. You may view the corrected roster by going to Roster History under Course Completion in the navigation bar.

What if I submit completed course credit for a licensee not tracked in CE Broker?

When a license number submitted does not match the license number in the Department of Health database, the entry will reject. Rejected entries may be viewed on the course completion roster.

I submitted a completed course credit for the wrong course publishing? How do I correct it?

Please send a message to the CE Broker helpdesk by clicking the "Contact CE Broker" links from within your account or from our homepage.

How do I post partial course completion credit?

For those professions where partial credit is permitted, you can grant partial credit by simply submitting the number of credit hours that should be granted. The system will override the approved course renewal hours with the number you submit, assuming the Regulating Board permits partial credit. CE Broker edits ensure the number of hours for each subject area does not exceed the maximum available for that course.

What Boards accept partial completion credit?

All Regulatory Boards EXCEPT the following accept partial completion credit: Medical Physicists, Board of Orthotists & Prosthetists, and Board of Optometry.

Do I have to report each session of a conference individually?

If you have entered the conference as one course, you may submit partial credit if allowed by the regulating Board via manual input, text upload, Excel upload, or XML upload.

The submission should only tally the portion(s) of the conference for which credits were completed.

How do I report continuing education credit for the instructors teaching the course we provide as an approved educational provider?

Educational providers do not report instructor continuing education credit. If allowed by their profession's rule, licensees who instruct courses can self report.

Does each profession have to be submitted separately when submitting course completion credit?

No, completed course credit posts to all professions for which the course was accepted.

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