Selected for a CPD Review: What Actually Happens

An email arrives saying you have been selected for a CPD review. The first question most people ask is why me — and the answer, from the bodies that publish it, is usually nothing to do with you at all.

ICAS answers it in six words:

You have been selected at random.

That is worth knowing before anything else, because the natural assumption is that selection means suspicion. Mostly it does not.

There are three different selection bases

And which one applies changes how you should read the email:

• Random. ICAS selects at random, noting that It is a requirement of ICAS to monitor the CPD activities of its Members on an annual basis. Austria’s accounting-professions authority also selects at random for the preceding calendar year.
• Statistical sample. ACCA conducts annual reviews of a statistical sample of members’ CPD to ensure they’re developing their knowledge and skills.
• Risk-based. Uganda’s institute runs an annual exercise to determine levels of members’ compliance with the CPD requirements and states plainly that Members are sampled on a risk basis.

Only the third implies anything about you specifically. And on the common hope that having already filed puts you out of reach, Uganda’s institute answers that directly: Yes. As long as you have been sampled for a particular year, you may be required to avail your CPD record and undergo a CPD compliance assessment. Submitting your return is not immunity.

What actually happens, step by step

ACCA publishes the fullest account of the process:

You’ll be notified by email that you’ve been selected for a CPD review and you’ll be instructed to submit your records via your myACCA account.

From there you can provide details of the activities you carried out, upload records or supporting documents, or confirm that you used the body’s own evidence recording tool — or any combination. What the reviewer is doing is stated:

We’ll be checking that you’ve met the CPD requirement for the route you’re following.

Note “the route you’re following”. Where a body offers more than one route — a unit route, an employer route, a part-time route — you are assessed against the one you declared, not against the default.

Then the deadline, which is the part to act on:

Please make sure to submit your records within 28 days of receiving your notification email.

And afterwards: the professional development team reviews the records and contacts you through your account with the outcome and any feedback, followed by a questionnaire about the review process itself.

The clocks, side by side

• ACCA — 28 days to submit from the notification email.
• Poland — 30 days to produce documentation from a request.
• Austria — two months to provide proof.
• ICAS — aims to complete the review of your record within 4 weeks, and adds that we will send no further communication regarding this unless we require further information from you.

That last clause is useful: silence after an ICAS review is a good sign, not an oversight.

On which period to submit, ICAS asks for a copy of your previous year’s record. CPA Australia warns that where a member’s triennium has moved following its system migration, a review will look at cumulative records as per old and new system — so check which window you are being assessed on rather than assuming. Our guide to when your CPD cycle actually starts covers why that is less obvious than it sounds.

Can you get help before you are judged?

SAICA is the only body we found that publishes a clear answer, and it publishes two.

Asked whether a member can send a reflective learning plan in for review and get help with weak areas, the answer is yes, by email to a named address. Asked whether there will be a chance to correct a plan found wanting during monitoring:

Yes, in cases where SAICA is dissatisfied with the quality of the reflective learning plan submitted through the monitoring procedures, it may require further information from the member through an interview.

Competency interviews are held through regional offices and members will get an opportunity to ask for guidance.

Read that precisely, though. It is a yes to an interview and guidance, not a stated right to amend the plan. And SAICA defines non-compliance as failing to submit the annual declaration on time or failing to submit plan evidence when selected — not as plan quality. So the quality conversation and the compliance determination are separate things.

What gets you in trouble is not the hours

ACCA states the consequence of non-engagement without hedging:

Members who don’t cooperate with the review process - for example by not responding to communications or failing to submit their CPD records - may be removed from the register of members.

That matches the published outcome data exactly. ACCA removed 796 members for CPD default in a recent year, and every removal was for paperwork or non-cooperation, none for doing too little CPD. The review is a correspondence test as much as a learning one — see what the figures actually show.

It is also worth noting the tone the bodies describe. ACCA says that if you are selected it will provide constructive feedback on your CPD activities, along with any help needed to meet the requirement. A review is not framed as an enforcement action.

What reviewers reject

Two documented specifics, both worth checking your file against now rather than on the day:

• CPA Australia states that presentation slides, registration emails and general course materials are not sufficient for verifying ethics CPD. These are precisely the things most people keep.
• Spain requires attendance control for the full duration of online activities, and forfeits self-study hours entirely where the member fails the assessment.

Our guide to CPD record examples sets out what a record that survives this looks like, and partial attendance covers how to state hours you only partly attended.

If you get the email, do this

• Diarise the deadline immediately. 28 days, 30 days and two months are the published windows. The deadline is the risk, not the content.
• Reply even if your record is incomplete. Non-response is the documented route to removal; a shortfall is not.
• Check which year and which route you are being assessed on before you compile anything.
• Send certificates and attendance records, not slides and not registration emails.
• Ask for guidance where it is offered. At least one body invites plans in for review before monitoring.

Frequently asked questions

Why was I selected for a CPD review? Usually at random or as part of a statistical sample. Only some bodies, such as Uganda’s institute, sample on a risk basis.

Does submitting my annual return protect me from being reviewed? No. At least one institute states expressly that you can still be sampled.

How long do I have to respond? ACCA sets 28 days from the notification email; Poland allows 30 days from a request; Austria two months.

What happens if I ignore it? ACCA states that members who do not cooperate, including by not responding, may be removed from the register.

Can I get help with my record first? SAICA invites reflective learning plans in for review and offers competency interviews with guidance where plan quality is questioned.

Be review-ready by default, with Learnsignal

A review you can answer in an afternoon is a matter of how the training was documented, not how much of it you did. Our certificated CPD courses issue records stating activity, date, duration and subject — what reviewers ask for. See also CPD penalties. ACCA’s review guidance is published at accaglobal.com.