2025 Insurance Carrier Appointment Renewals for Individual Producers
New Year, new resolutions, like growing your distribution channel while maintaining compliance!
To help you stay on top of your initial appointments, AgentSync Manage and Autopilot use our API-powered architecture to transmit data securely and effectively from you to NIPR to the states. However, for renewal appointments, state invoicing is still fairly low-tech. So, while AgentSync helps you keep your records clean and submit producer appointments and terminations in a timely manner, we don’t do renewals. But we can help you mark your calendars and keep your 2025 renewal deadlines in mind.
What are state requirements for carrier appointment renewals?
Most states require carriers to report their individual appointments, and many of them also require a period – annually or biennially – where carriers pay a fee to maintain their appointments. This also incentivizes an accurate accounting of which producers have relationships with which carriers and where.
The insurance industry and compliance nerds have spent many digital pixels on the requirements for initial appointments and how to optimize those timelines for savings and efficiency. If you want to read our take on using Just-In-Time appointment regulation to save your business thousands of dollars, go for it.
Yet, less time and attention goes into the ongoing maintenance of those individual producer appointments once a carrier has made them. Here, we’ll detail the variations between requirements and timelines for state insurance appointment renewal and termination deadlines.
If you have more specific questions that aren’t covered here, feel free to visit our Compliance Library and click into your relevant jurisdictions to get more data on state-by-state specifics.
State appointment termination and appointment renewal deadlines
States that require carriers to renew producer appointments on an annual or biennial cycle do so by compiling a list of the producers or business entities (where applicable) that are on record as being appointed by the carrier. (It’s also worth noting here that “carrier” in this case may also mean any MGAs/MGUs that have a duty to appoint thanks to their carrier contract.)
Carriers should review their appointments and be sure to terminate any producers who aren’t still actively writing business for them. It’s important to terminate inactive producers before a state sends you an appointment renewal invoice; once a state opens the invoice, you usually have to pay it as-is. The state will generally post the finalized appointment renewal invoice for a carrier to pay over a matter of weeks or even months, and many of them are open on the National Insurance Producer Registry (NIPR).
Also worth mentioning? If you don’t want your insurance carrier to be stuck with a big fat producer appointment renewal list to analyze every time a state starts its appointment renewal season, word on the street is that AgentSync’s terminations process makes it far easier to stay up-to-date and accurately track your active appointments. Further, AgentSync’s robust reporting allows you to easily view which producers have appointments in states where they aren’t writing a single dollar of business. Terminating producers in states where they don’t write your business is one easy way to return dollars (possibly tens of thousands of them!) to your budget.
Following is a rolling calendar-year list of states that have announced their producer appointment renewals and termination deadlines for 2025:
Illinois deadlines for carrier appointment of limited lines producer renewals
Terminations for Illinois limited lines producers due Oct. 28, 2024. Illinois carrier appointment renewals for limited lines producers invoice payments open Nov. 5, 2024, to Jan. 2, 2025.
Oklahoma deadlines for carrier appointment of producer renewals
Terminations for Oklahoma carrier appointments due Nov. 15, 2024. Oklahoma carrier appointment renewal invoice payment open Nov. 25, 2024, to Jan. 2, 2025.
Louisiana deadlines for carrier appointment of producer renewals
Terminations for Louisiana carrier appointments due Nov. 22, 2024. Louisiana carrier appointment renewal invoice payment open Nov. 27, 2024, to Jan. 2, 2025.
Kansas deadlines for carrier appointment of producer renewals
Terminations for Kansas carrier appointments due Dec. 26, 2024. Kansas carrier appointment renewal invoice payment open Jan. 2 to March 1, 2025.
Wisconsin deadlines for carrier appointment of producer renewals
Terminations for Wisconsin carrier appointments due Dec. 31, 2024. Wisconsin carrier appointment renewal invoice payment open Jan. 6 to March 15, 2025.
Iowa deadlines for carrier appointment of producer renewals
Terminations for Iowa carrier appointments due Dec. 27, 2024. Iowa carrier appointment renewal invoice payment open Jan. 6 to March 17, 2025.
New Mexico deadlines for carrier appointment of producer renewals
Terminations for New Mexico carrier appointments due Dec. 27, 2024. New Mexico carrier appointment renewals for producers invoice payments open Jan. 2 to April 30, 2025.
Kentucky deadlines for carrier appointment of producer renewals
Terminations for Kentucky carrier appointments due Dec. 31, 2024. Kentucky carrier appointment renewals for producers invoice payments open Jan. 3 to June 30, 2025.
Alabama deadlines for carrier appointment of producer renewals
Terminations for Alabama carrier appointments due Dec. 31, 2024. Alabama carrier appointment renewal invoice payment open Jan. 6 to March 1, 2025.
Wyoming deadlines for carrier appointment of producer renewals
Terminations for Wyoming carrier appointments due Jan. 31, 2025. Wyoming carrier appointment renewal invoice payment open Feb. 1 to March 31, 2025.
North Carolina deadlines for carrier appointment of producer renewals
Terminations for North Carolina carrier appointments due Jan. 22, 2025. North Carolina carrier appointment renewal invoice payment open Feb. 3 to March 31, 2025.
North Dakota deadlines for carrier appointment of producer renewals
Terminations for North Dakota carrier appointments due Feb. 14, 2025. North Dakota carrier appointment renewal invoice payment open March 3 to April 30, 2025.
States with fixed carrier appointment renewal rules
Not all states have big announcements for upcoming renewal periods. Many states have very set annual or biennial renewal rules, such as:
Kansas and Michigan both historically have a fixed renewal period, posting their invoices for carriers to pay through the month of January. However, it’s worth noting that Kansas is planning to move toward a perpetual appointment cycle. Meanwhile, Rhode Island is joining the appointment herd, requiring carriers to renew appointments each January, although, as the first year for appointments, this one is a little wonky (but we’re all doing our best, we love you, Rhodey).
Maine has a very … particular rule. If your company was first formed in the months from January to June, then your appointments will renew in your anniversary month in even years; if your company’s formation anniversary is July through December, you’ll renew appointments in odd years. The state sends carriers a reminder to terminate inactive producers six weeks before their anniversary month. The first week of your anniversary month, the state will send you the renewal invoice and you have 30 days to pay it.
Florida is also particular, and requires appointments during the appointed producer’s birth month every two years. This means, instead of a company doing a single appointment renewal season, you may have some producers needing to renew appointments for every month.
South Carolina’s fixed appointment renewal period is in September. Shout out to South Carolina for keeping it simple!
Some states also have “perpetual” appointments, meaning they don’t require a renewal for at least some of their producers. However, interpretations of what it means to be “perpetual” vary widely based on resident vs. non-resident, firm vs. individual, and line of authority. (These states are definitely worth a peek in the Compliance Library to understand some of the nuance.)
- California
- Colorado (for the few licenses the state appoints)
- Delaware
- Hawaii
- Puerto Rico
- Montana
- New Hampshire
- Tennessee
- Texas
- Utah
- Vermont (carriers not domiciled in Vermont must follow a periodic renewal season and fee rule)
Registry appointment states
These states don’t generally require carriers to report appointed producers to the state department of insurance, but they do require carriers to maintain an internal registry of producers (hence the moniker “Registry state”).
However, even in Registry states, you may want to give yourself an annual checkup to ensure you’re adequately maintaining your internal records – appointment violations tend to be like seatbelt laws. You likely won’t be pulled over for driving without yours clicked, but you better believe the officer will throw it on the ticket if you’re pulled over for anything else.
Registry appointment states:
- Alaska
- Arizona
- Colorado (with a few excepted lines)
- Illinois (with a few excepted lines)
- Indiana
- Maryland (with a few excepted lines)
- Missouri
- Oregon
Best practices for handling producer appointment renewals
Having a smooth carrier appointment renewal season for yourself and your producers means practicing good distribution channel management throughout the year.
Stay on top of producer appointments throughout the year with AgentSync. What you don’t want is to get an invoice that doesn’t show a producer who’s been writing your business in a state for months and months. If the state doesn’t know an agent is your agent, then there’s a good chance you now have out-of-compliance sales on the books.
Be proactive with producer terminations using AgentSync. Don’t wait until the last minute to review your producers and see who is writing business, who is working in an admin capacity, and who doesn’t actually need an appointment in a given state. That’s a surefire way to end up on the hook for expensive appointment renewal fees for insurance producers who aren’t actually producing in that state. AgentSync’s bulk terminations can help you meet state termination deadlines without hours of administrative panic.
Use distribution channel management software (!AgentSync!) that lets you make a list and check it twice against the state invoice. Bonus points: Audit logs can prove when a termination was submitted in the event that a state mistakenly invoices you for an ex-producer.
Leverage AgentSync to take the headaches out of producer management
Renewals are just one tickbox in the extensive checklist of producer management tasks. Producer management is just one component of the larger strategy around how to optimize and scale distribution channels. Automating as much of the producer lifecycle as possible frees you up to manage by exception, focusing on tasks that can’t be automated, such as renewals. Optimizing your operations sooner than later will put your organization in a better position to handle unforeseen challenges.
Hundreds of leading insurance organizations use the AgentSync platform to scale and optimize their distribution networks for future success. To learn more about how AgentSync can unlock your distribution channel potential, or for a personalized review of your current distribution channel management strategy, talk to one of our experts today.
About AgentSync
AgentSync provides Distribution Channel Management (DCM) solutions that connect the insurance ecosystem. By automating producer onboarding workflows and integrating real-time data across systems, AgentSync enables insurers to scale and optimize their distribution networks while remaining compliant. Our configurable, intuitive platform simplifies the producer ready-to-sell process, supported by API connectivity for seamless data exchange across systems. AgentSync recognizes compliance as the ultimate enabler for optimized distribution, unlocking new revenue opportunity and agility to adapt in a rapidly evolving industry. Founded in 2018 by Niji Sabharwal and Jenn Knight, and headquartered in Denver, CO, AgentSync has been recognized as one of Denver’s Best Places to Work, a Forbes Magazine Cloud 100 Rising Star, an Insurtech Insights Future 50 winner, and was ranked 65th in Forbes’ America’s Best Startup Employers 2023. To learn more, visit www.agentsync.io.