FAQs

All course materials are copyrighted by IRMI, WebCE, or other WebCE business affiliates. (The copyright holder is printed or displayed with each course.) Purchase of a course includes a license for one person to use the course materials. This person may view the course online, save it on a single computer for his or her personal viewing, or print a copy for his or her personal use.

Absent specific written permission from the applicable copyright holder, it is not permissible to distribute files containing course materials or printed versions of course materials to individuals who have not purchased the courses. For example, you should never e-mail a PDF file of a course to someone else. It is also not permissible to make the course materials available to others over a computer network, Intranet, Internet, or any other storage, transmittal, or retrieval system.

Please follow these guidelines and contact IRMI if your business needs require some other form of use. Violation of this license could subject you or your employer to substantial statutory remedies under federal law (e.g., $10,000 per violation) and possible liability for actual damages and punitive damages.

Yes. The ERIS program primarily focuses on the application of coverage in standard US property and casualty insurance forms. However, it could be quite helpful to a non-US resident if your firm or your clients have projects in the United States. Unfortunately, our system cannot process non-US addresses from the ERIS Learning Center online, so please call WebCE at (877) 488-9313 between 8:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. Monday-Friday central time to place your order. Courses and exams will be available to you online.

The ERIS continuing education (CE) program curriculum is intended to be on a basic-to-intermediate level, but it does cover complex insurance topics and assumes you have basic knowledge of insurance terminology and fundamentals. Therefore, the core curriculum will be more challenging to someone who has no insurance background than it will be for someone who does.  

 A person who has limited insurance knowledge can successfully complete the courses by by carefully studying the core curriculum texts and paying attention to any concepts with which he or she struggles when taking the final exams. If you do not pass an exam the first time, these concepts can be the focus of additional study before retaking the exam.

You usually can receive credit under other programs. For example, completing an ERIS course will probably count toward continuing education requirements for CPCUs.

Obtaining the ERIS certification also may satisfy the requirement of completing a non-NAIW educational program/designation to earn the Certified Professional Insurance Woman/Man (CPIW/M) certification from the National Association of Insurance Women (NAIW).

There are three simple steps to obtaining and maintaining the ERIS certification:

Go to the Voucher/Promotion/Completer Code Redemption page in the ERIS Learning Center to report your attendance and pay the reaccreditation fee. You will need the Completer Code number printed on the Certificate of Completion or in the e-mail the program sponsor provided you when you do so. The fee for this reaccreditation option pays the costs of administering this part of the ERIS program.

Chartered Property Casualty Underwriter (CPCU), Certified Insurance Counselor (CIC), and Associate in Risk Management (ARM) are all excellent educational programs for risk and insurance professionals. The ERIS program is not intended to compete with or be a substitute for these or other insurance industry designations. The ERIS curriculum is less rigorous and less time consuming than the CPCU, CIC, or ARM program. The CPCU program requires passing exams for 8, and the ARM 3, courses that cover the equivalent of a college semester's material in each. The CIC program requires attending five 2½-day seminars, each of which is followed by a 2-hour final exam. While the ERIS program is not as rigorous as these other programs, its specialized focus on the complex insurance needs of the energy industry make it a worthwhile investment for people who hold one or more of these designations as well as for people who do not.

Depending on your current level of knowledge in the subject matter, an ERIS course will typically take 6 to 10 hours to complete. The average length of a ERIS course is about 100 printed pages. The text includes a few practice questions following each chapter, which you may answer at your option. After reading the course, you take the final exam, which is composed of multiple-choice questions. The number of questions presented is dependent on your state's CE requirements if you choose to receive insurance CE credit and will be between 25 and 50 multiple choice questions. If you don't request CE credit, the exam will be 50 questions. If you do not pass the final exam the first time, you may study the material again and retake the exam.

The final exam for each course contains questions randomly selected from a test bank. The number of questions varies according to state insurance CE requirements, but there will be no more than 50. You must correctly answer 70 percent of the exam questions to pass a course. If you fail to do so, you review the course again and take another test that is randomly generated from the question bank.

The five core courses have been approved for insurance CE credit in all 50 states. Reaccreditation courses will be filed as they are introduced. The amount of credit provided ranges between 4 and 12 hours, depending on the course and state. To learn how much credit is available in your state, please go to the  ERISLearning Center, go to the Course Catalog, choose the course(s) you wish to take, and indicate the state for which you need CE credit. You'll also need to select a license type for most states. The number of approved credit hours for that state will then be displayed on your screen.

As a holder of the certification, you are granted a license to display it in connection with your name. The most common format is to place a comma after your name, followed by the certification abbreviation (e.g., John Doe, ERIS). Alternatively, you may spell out the certification name (Energy Risk and Insurance Specialist) in connection with your name; the most common approach for this is on letterhead or brochures. You may display it following your name on your business cards, marketing literature, or letterhead.

We do not waive any of the ERIS core courses for those who hold degrees or other certifications for two reasons. First, the ERIS program is uniquely focused on the needs of energy risks. Other more general programs do not include this unique industry focus, and we feel that allowing them to offset the ERIS courses could detract from the credibility of the ERIS program. Second, we designed the ERIS program in a manner to allow easy and efficient administration of the program. By keeping our overhead costs quite low, we can offer the courses at very competitive prices. Implementing a system for cross crediting other educational programs and verifying that applicants indeed hold those certifications would increase our expenses and require us to charge more for the program.

While we do not waive the ERIS core courses, we do allow credit for certain other educational programs in meeting the ongoing continuing education requirement.

Many people charged with purchasing their company's insurance feel helpless and lost when dealing with their insurance representatives. Once you have obtained the ERIS certification, you'll know the language and the key issues to address in your insurance program. The ongoing continuing education program will hone your knowledge and equip you to be a far better steward of your firm's insurance and risk management program. You'll have the confidence and knowledge to make the right risk management and insurance purchasing decisions, to avoid onerous risk and insurance provisions in your contracts, and to negotiate the best deals for your company.

Continuous learning is important for all business professionals, particularly those who work in a field that changes rapidly, as does energy insurance. The ERIS core curriculum will be a great review of insurance and contractual risk transfer fundamentals for contractors. Completing the core courses will help you maintain confidence that your knowledge is up-to-date. The ongoing continuing education program will then help you stay on top of the trends and developments affecting your important accounts. And if you are an agent or broker in need of state insurance CE credit, obtaining the ERIS certification allows you to leverage your CE effort into a meaningful professional certification as well.

When you obtain the ERIS certification, you make a statement to your energy clients that you are committed to serving them and have the knowledge to do it well. Your enhanced credibility along with the confidence you'll gain as a result of your new knowledge will improve your ability to sell insurance and negotiate intelligently on your clients’ behalf with underwriters or adjusters. You may also elect to have your name, firm, and phone number included in the directory of ERIS professionals when the directory is launched in 2017.

Any CE credit earned by taking ERIS courses or attending a seminar may be used to meet the renewal requirement for the 12-month period in which the credit is earned. We are sorry, but we cannot roll CE credit into a future period.

IRMI is proud to bring ERIS to you using WebCE's state-of-the-art Internet delivery system. WebCE is the premier provider of Internet-based continuing education courses for insurance agents, brokers, and others. More than 850,000 insurance CE courses are completed on WebCE's system each year. The courses are self-paced, allowing you to take breaks and go back to the point where you left off in the course when you are ready to continue.

Generally, yes. Sponsors of seminars, webinars, and conferences must request approval from IRMI for a program to qualify for the ERIS continuing education requirement. To qualify, a program's content must be substantially directed to risk, insurance, surety, financial, or legal topics relevant to the energy industry. 

If you attend a seminar or conference that has not been preapproved, you may still get credit. Submit information about the seminar or conference to [email protected] and request that it be reviewed for credit.

If you fail to meet the continuing education requirement, you lose the certification and the right to use it in connection with your name. Once you lose the certification in this manner, you must complete the core curriculum again to regain it.

We will e-mail you at the e-mail address on record in the Learning Center in the event you lose your certification because you failed to meet the experience requirement. However, it is your responsibility to keep up with your CE status, and failure to receive the e-mail does not make it permissible to use the certification after it expires. In other words, your license to use the ERIS trademark expires 12 months after you earn the right to use the certification unless you renew it by meeting the CE requirement during that time. Thereafter, you must complete the continuing education requirement every 12 months.

IRMI also reserves the right to revoke the certification for anyone who

In the event IRMI revokes your certification, IRMI will e-mail notification and send a registered letter to the e-mail address and postal address on record in the Learning Center. Your license to use the certification expires 3 business days after the registered letter is mailed whether or not you receive the letter. (It is your responsibility to maintain current contact information in the ERIS Learning Center.)

The ERIS certification is a registered federal trademark of IRMI and is protected under the law. Anyone who uses this trademark without permission is subject to severe financial penalty. Please contact IRMI to report any suspected violations in the use of this trademark.

You must correctly answer 70 percent of the multiple-choice questions on the final exam to successfully complete a ERIS course. Keep in mind that you can retake the exam if you fail to pass it. If you have not requested CE credit, there is no limit to the number of times you may take the exam. If you request CE credit, the number of retakes may be limited by your state.

IRMI has affiliated with WebCE.com, LLC, a nationwide supplier of state-of-the-art, self-paced continuing education courses to host the IRMI ERIS Learning Center and provide you with customer support. We chose WebCE because the firm has a long history of success in the CE business, has developed a premier online delivery system, and upholds the same standards of quality that we do.

WebCE is the official CE provider for your courses, and this will be reflected on your certificate of completion. WebCE ships all course materials, validates completed tests, issues certificates, does the billing, and provides customer support.

Should you have specific questions about or problems with your service, contact WebCE directly:

Contact: WebCE
Phone: (877) 488-9313

For more details regarding WebCE and how your ERIS account will be serviced, see the ERIS Learning Center Help.

The objectives of the ERIS program are to (1) assure that certification-holders understand the fundamental insurance needs of energy companies, (2) demonstrate certification holders' commitment to the energy industry, and (3) provide certification holders with the means to stay abreast of energy risk and insurance developments and trends. The core curriculum satisfies only the first of these three objectives, and the ongoing continuing education requirement is necessary for the program to achieve the other two.

We do not intend for this requirement to be onerous. You may satisfy it through just one additional online course or attending an approved seminar or conference.

We will e-mail you several months before your certification expires to remind you of the need to renew your certification by taking additional ERIS courses or attending approved conferences or seminars. It is your responsibility to keep your e-mail address updated in the https://www.webce.com/eris/ to ensure you receive these e-mails.