Changing State Boards Mid-CPA: What Transfers, What You Pay for Twice, and Why to Wait Until the Fourth Pass

NASBA's candidate FAQs answer "how do I get my passed exams transferred" by asking one back: "Is there a specific reason why you are transferring scores while in the process of taking the exams?" The rest of the answer explains why the question is rhetorical. Before a new board finds you eligible you need a fresh education evaluation, and an evaluation is not an afternoon. In NASBA's words, "this takes time away from your conditional credit for the two sections you have passed".

The sections themselves are hostage to nothing. Scores move, and through NASBA's own store they move for free. What does not move is your eligibility, the evaluation report you paid for, the Notice to Schedule in your inbox, and the months left on the credit you hold. A candidate in Riyadh who sat under Montana or Washington because those boards read a Saudi degree and wanted no US address will often prefer to be licensed elsewhere. The question is not whether. It is when.

NASBA's answer, and every fee schedule's, is after the fourth pass.

Why Gulf candidates end up in the wrong jurisdiction

The board that lets you sit and the board that will license you are chosen against different filters, and candidates apply the first years before discovering the second.

The exam filter is mechanical: will the board read a foreign degree, will it let you sit at 120 hours, does it demand a Social Security Number, does it permit international testing. That last question removes four jurisdictions before you open a book, because NASBA states that candidates of Alabama, Idaho, North Carolina and the Virgin Islands cannot schedule at international test centres. A Gulf candidate chooses among 51, on the criteria in CPA Exam Requirements for International Candidates.

The licence filter is a different list: whether a US CPA you can reach may verify your experience, whether the board is one-tier or two-tier, whether it sets a deadline to finish your education after you pass. Those are in Passed All Four? How to Get the CPA Licence From the Gulf. A board can be excellent on the first list and impossible on the second, and nothing in the application says so.

Since 2025 there is a third reason to reconsider. The Uniform Accountancy Act now carries a further route to licensure, a 120-hour bachelor's degree plus two years of experience plus the exam, and mobility now turns on the individual's own qualifications. NASBA is explicit that "individual jurisdictions must formally enact legislation to adopt the new models" and that implementation dates vary, so the board that could not license you on a 120-hour degree when you applied may be able to now.

What actually moves: scores, not eligibility

Credit belongs neither to NASBA nor to you. NASBA says so plainly: "The Boards of Accountancy are the only entities with the authority to grant, extend or void examination credit." A transfer moves a record of your scores, and the receiving board then decides under its own rules whether to grant credit for them.

Texas publishes the clearest version of that decision. It takes credit in only where "CPA Exam credit is active in the other state" and where you met the other state's education requirements when the credit was earned, those standards being "equal to or higher than the Texas standards". Then the sentence that catches anyone who sat at 120 hours: "Deficiencies in education may not be completed while taking the CPA Exam."

What you hold	Does it travel?
Passing scores	Yes, free through NASBA's store or on the board's form.
Credit and its expiry date	Re-granted by the new board under its own rule, not carried across.
Eligibility to sit	No. You apply again, from the start.
Your education evaluation	No. It was written for one board's rules.
An unused Notice to Schedule	No. Coded to the old board, not refunded, expiring anyway.
Expired credit	Never, anywhere.

The expiry row is the one candidates misread, because transferring does not restart the clock. Oregon's rule, amended with effect from 1 February 2026, says a score transferred from another jurisdiction is valid for thirty months "from the date the exam section was passed", not from the date it arrived. Whether your own board runs 30 months or still 18, and counts from the sitting or from score release, is the subject of The CPA Exam 30-Month Rule.

Expiry is absolute. NASBA, on the 2024 credit extensions some boards adopted and some did not: "you cannot transfer to a jurisdiction that did as expired credit is non-transferrable".

The two routes, and what they cost

Which route is open is decided by the board you sat under. The first is the Authorization for Interstate Exchange of Examination and Licensure Information. You complete the top, with your identifying details and any certificate number. The board where you sat completes the rest, and it reports more than grades: whether a certificate was granted originally or by reciprocity and when, the scores, whether any licence from that board is in good standing and when it expires, and a box headed "exceptions noted/explanations", where disciplinary history goes. It goes to the board where you passed, not the one you are joining.

The second is NASBA's Transfer of CPA Examination Scores through its store, which sends your scores, "passed and/or failed", to another participating board of accountancy. It is free, it states about five business days, and it is a pair of dropdowns: "if your jurisdiction does not appear in the drop down menu you will need to contact your board office directly." The FAQs are blunter. Where your jurisdiction is not a listed "From Jurisdiction", "NASBA is not authorized to transfer your scores, and you must request those directly from your state board."

Nothing about the price is national. NASBA publishes a fee schedule for all 55 jurisdictions and the transfer-of-grades line runs from nothing to US$75.

Board	Transfer of grades, as of 2026
Alabama	Free. The forms "are completed by the Board at no charge".
Most boards that charge at all	US$25, handled by NASBA.
Texas	US$40 to send Texas credit out.
Mississippi	US$50.
New Mexico	US$75.

Read it as a shape. The only line that matters is your board's.

Switching mid-exam costs you window, not money

NASBA sets out the sequence for a candidate two sections in who wants to finish elsewhere: a new education evaluation application, educational documentation, and, for an international candidate, a report "which must be tailored to the new jurisdiction before you can even be found eligible". Only then is the evaluation completed, and only then can you apply for an NTS.

Put dates on that. NASBA International Evaluation Services states six weeks from the day your documents are complete, and those weeks start when your university has posted a sealed transcript, not when you ask. The board's own processing sits on top. Throughout, you cannot sit, and the credit you hold ages at the ordinary rate.

Any NTS held under the old board is dead weight. Illinois states the common rule: "The NTS is good for only 6 months", no refunds for untested sections, and the codes on it report your score to the issuing board. With the NASBA section fee at US$268.59 from July 2026 and a US$390 international surcharge at Gulf centres, that is over US$650 committed to a section you will now register again. The arithmetic is in What the CPA Exam Costs from Saudi Arabia and the Gulf.

The real cost is months of window. A candidate fourteen months from the expiry of their oldest section who spends two of them waiting on an evaluation has not lost a fee. They have lost a sitting, and will pay for that section twice.

The cheap version is after the fourth pass

NASBA's advice is one sentence: "You should continue to take the exams as a Georgia candidate and once you have passed all your CPA Exams, then transfer those scores to Tennessee and apply for licensure at that time."

Once the fourth score is released there is no window left to eat, and the move becomes a licensure application rather than an exam one. Montana names the route precisely: Transfer of Grades is "for individuals applying for licensure in Montana that have passed the CPA exam in another jurisdiction and are not licensed in another jurisdiction". Reciprocity is the separate route, for those already licensed.

You still pay: the score transfer, free to US$75; a change in jurisdiction evaluation where the board wants one, US$135; the licence fee. What you are no longer risking is a section.

Two qualifications. A few boards run a clock that starts when the exam ends: Texas allows 36 months from passing all sections to complete the education requirement before credit for all of them expires. And a board tests your education as it stood on the date each section was passed, so finishing the exam cures no deficiency that was there when you sat.

The evaluation you paid for may not travel either

Evaluation reports are written for boards, not candidates. NASBA's phrasing: "each international evaluation report is completed based on a specific jurisdiction and the specific requirements of that jurisdiction". A second board will not simply read the first one.

In the good case the fix is a line item. NIES sells a Change in Jurisdiction Evaluation at US$135 where your existing NIES report is less than five years old, and where a board's rule change has left a report describing rules that no longer apply. Older than five years and you pay the full international evaluation fee again, US$250 as of 2026. Washington says it outright: if NIES evaluated your education for another jurisdiction and you now want a Washington licence, NIES must complete a Change in Jurisdiction Evaluation against Washington's requirements.

In the bad case it is worth nothing. Texas does not accept it: "Evaluations from international credential services are not accepted by the Board." It evaluates international documents itself, through board staff and the University of Texas at Austin. Twenty-five jurisdictions sit at the other extreme and take NIES and nothing else. Which camp your second board falls into is in CPA Credential Evaluation for Gulf Degrees. Read a board's evaluation page before its fee page.

Choosing the second board better than you chose the first

Run the questions in this order, and notice where fees come.

Question	Why it sits here
Is the credit still active where I earned it?	If it has expired it is gone everywhere. No board grants credit another has voided.
Will it grant credit for sections passed elsewhere, and on what conditions?	Texas tests your education as it stood when each section was passed. Others are looser.
Which evaluator does it accept, and does my report survive?	US$135 for a change in jurisdiction report, US$250 for a new one, or neither.
Can anyone verify my experience under its rule?	What decides whether the licence ever issues, and the question asked last.
Has it adopted the 30-month rule and the 120-hour pathway?	Both are adopted board by board, on each board's timetable.
What does it charge?	Tens of dollars, against a decision worth years.

One rule overrides the table. Do not switch to escape an expiry: it does not work, and NASBA has said so in writing. And do not switch mid-exam for a reason that will still be true in eight months, when switching is free.

Where to practise this

FAR is the section most candidates pass first, so its credit expires first and a mid-exam switch is likeliest to cost it. Prepito's FAR course covers the full blueprint with practice questions, timed simulations, full explanations and mistake review, in English. The qualification as a whole is in the CPA programme.

CPA questions and written explanations are in English. Prepito’s interface is available in English and Arabic, and the AI tutor can respond in either language.

For the licence itself, see Passed All Four? How to Get the CPA Licence From the Gulf and How Long the CPA Takes From the Gulf.

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Sources: NASBA Candidate FAQs, NASBA Store score transfer, NASBA interstate authorization fees, NASBA Change in Jurisdiction Evaluation, NASBA on credit extensions, NASBA on the new licensure pathways, NASBA on the NTS, Texas State Board, Transfer of Credit, Oregon OAR 801-010-0060, Washington Board of Accountancy, Montana Board, Transfer of Grades, Illinois Board of Examiners. Transfer routes, fees, credit periods and accepted evaluators are set board by board and revised without notice; figures are as published in 2026. Confirm both boards' pages before moving anything.