Enrolled Agent Exam Registration: Step-by-Step Process

The SEE is the exam standing between you and the EA credential, unless you're one of the small number of former IRS employees who qualify for an exemption. It's genuinely thorough — federal tax law, IRS procedure, the works — and that difficulty is more or less the whole point. An Enrolled Agent gets to represent taxpayers before the IRS on nearly any matter, in any state. No restrictions that some other preparers deal with.

Three parts make it up:

• Part 1 – Individuals — individual taxation
• Part 2 – Businesses — business entities and related tax matters
• Part 3 – Representation, Practices and Procedures — ethics, procedure, how representation actually works

You book them separately. Order doesn't matter — start with whichever one feels least intimidating. Some people knock out Part 2 first because it overlaps with their day job. Others save Part 3 for last since it's shorter to prepare for. Either way works fine, as long as all three eventually get passed.

If you're going the standard route to becoming an EA, you need to register for and pass all three parts. No degree required — which explains why this credential attracts such an odd mix of people. Bookkeepers. Commerce graduates. Career-changers who don't want to sink years into another qualification just to get where they're headed.

A small group of former IRS staff can skip the exam entirely, based on their technical background with the agency. Different track altogether, and not something most people reading this need to worry about.

Here's the thing people misread most often though: passing the exam doesn't hand you the EA title. There's still an application and a background review sitting on the other side of it. We'll come back to that.

Step 1: Obtain Your PTIN

A PTIN is what the IRS assigns to anyone preparing tax returns for pay. It's also, more relevantly here, the very first thing you need before an SEE appointment can be booked at all.

You apply online through the IRS's PTIN system. Identifying details, an address, sometimes information pulled from a past U.S. tax filing. No Social Security Number? There's a separate application path for that — built specifically for foreign applicants, asking for different documents instead. Most Indian candidates end up on this version. Read the instructions properly rather than assuming the standard form will just work.

Processing time isn't something we'll guess at here — it moves around, and a number printed today could be wrong in a month. Just apply early. That's really the only advice that holds up regardless of when you're reading this.

Step 2: Create Your PSI Account

This is where 2026 actually changed something, and also where a lot of outdated content is still sitting around, uncorrected. Prometric ran the SEE for close to twenty years. That stopped on March 1, 2026, when the IRS moved the exam over to a new vendor, PSI Services. If you land on a page walking you through Prometric's old login screen — close it. That version's gone.

Registration happens through PSI's platform now. Set up a candidate profile: personal details, PTIN, all fairly routine. One catch worth flagging — your name on that profile has to match your government photo ID exactly. Drop a middle name or add an initial that isn't on your passport, and it can cause real friction on test day. Check it before you submit, not after.

Step 3: Select the EA Exam Part

Profile's live. Now pick a part.

Nobody's forcing you to book all three together. Quite a few candidates spread them out over months, which gives actual room to study between attempts instead of trying to hold three exams' worth of material in your head at once.

Step 4: Choose Your Exam Date and Appointment

Pick a date and time. Depending where you're located, you might get a choice between an in-person test center or a remote proctored session — both currently open to candidates inside the U.S.

Before paying, read the appointment summary properly. Part, date, time, format. Once booked, you'll get a confirmation number and an email. Don't lose either.

If you're testing from outside the U.S., there's a wrinkle worth knowing before you get this far — more on it below. International scheduling and testing are currently delayed while PSI finishes building out remote proctoring for candidates abroad. Temporary situation, tied to the vendor switch. Not a permanent halt.

Step 5: Pay the Enrolled Agent Exam Fee

$317 per part, charged when you schedule.

• 1 part = $317
• 2 parts = $634
• 3 parts = $951

Paid is paid — no refunds, no transfers. Double-check the date before you commit to anything. And this one's worth saying twice because people genuinely mix it up: this fee is not connected to the $140 charged later at the enrollment stage. Different fee. Different step. Usually months apart.

Step 6: Confirm Your Registration

Go back over the confirmation. Part, date, time, format, and — yes — the spelling of your own name. Save that confirmation number and email somewhere you'll actually find again later. You'll need the number if anything about the appointment needs sorting.

PTIN fees get adjusted from time to time, so check IRS.gov directly instead of trusting whatever number a site printed months back. The $317 and $140 figures here come straight off the IRS's own enrolled agent FAQ page.

Normally the SEE window runs May 1 through the end of February, with March and April blocked off for content updates.

This cycle's a bit different because of the vendor change. Domestic testing under PSI runs July 1, 2026, through February 28, 2027. That's the window if you're testing inside the U.S.

International testing is running on its own separate, still-unresolved timeline. It keeps shifting as PSI works through its rollout, so don't build plans around a date picked up secondhand. Check the IRS's enrolled agent FAQ page or the PSI portal — and check close to when you actually plan to book, not weeks ahead.

Three, total. Not all at once, though. Each is booked and paid for on its own, taken in whatever order suits you. What matters is timing — pass one part, and the clock generally gives three years to clear the other two before that pass expires.

This is probably the section you actually came for.

PTIN without a U.S. SSN. Most Indian candidates don't have one, so it's the IRS's alternate PTIN process instead — different supporting documents, same end result.

Government ID. The name on your PSI profile needs to match your passport or other ID exactly. That's what you're showing up with on test day, and a mismatch causes exactly the kind of trouble you'd expect.

PSI account and remote testing. International candidates test remotely, with a live proctor, and there's no in-person center option right now. That means a quiet room, a working webcam, decent internet, and a machine meeting PSI's technical requirements — sorted out ahead of time, not the night before.

Where things actually stand. Right now, scheduling and testing for international candidates is delayed while PSI finishes the technical side of remote proctoring outside the U.S. No new dates yet. If you've already passed a part or two and you're worried about losing credit while this drags on, the IRS has said it'll extend the carryover window for candidates caught up in the delay. Still — check the IRS's enrolled agent FAQ page and the PSI portal yourself before assuming anything. This is the piece of the process most likely to move again without much warning.

Payment. Once international testing reopens, plan on paying in U.S. dollars with an internationally enabled card, plus whatever conversion fee your bank adds.

Registering is step one of something longer:

PTIN → SEE Registration → Pass Part 1 → Pass Part 2 → Pass Part 3 → Form 23 Application → Suitability Check → Enrolled Agent

Pass all three parts, and there's a one-year window to file Form 23 with the $140 fee. After that, the IRS runs a suitability check — tax compliance, background — before EA status is actually granted.

• Following an old Prometric-based guide instead of the current PSI process
• Booking before the PTIN is actually active
• Entering a name on the PSI profile that doesn't match the ID
• Booking the wrong exam part by mistake
• Skipping a check on the current testing window before planning study time
• Ignoring international testing delays and assuming a fixed date anyway
• Confusing the $317 SEE fee with the separate $140 Form 23 fee
• Losing the confirmation number and email
• Waiting until the last slots in the window to book
• Studying from prep material that hasn't caught up with the PSI switch

☐ Get your PTIN ☐ Create your PSI account ☐ Select your SEE exam part ☐ Choose your appointment date and format ☐ Pay the $317 fee ☐ Receive your confirmation ☐ Prepare for the exam ☐ Take the exam ☐ Pass all three parts ☐ Submit Form 23 ☐ Complete the suitability check