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How are carryover hours calculated from a two-year reporting period to the next?

Supreme Court Rule(s) cited in this FAQ: Rule 794 .

When you earn CLE hours in a two-year reporting period that equal or exceed both the general and specific professional responsibility (PR) MCLE requirements, you may carry over hours, but the MCLE Rules set limits. Exceptions are explained below, under the three examples.

You may carry over a maximum of 10 credit hours, including PR hours from the most recent reporting period in the past. For your first transcript reporting period, you must report the number of carryover credits you earned in the most recent reporting period to the Board so that these hours are added to your current transcript. In future transcript reporting periods, carryover credit will be calculated for you and automatically transferred to your transcript for the next reporting period. If you rely on carryover credit, you must keep careful records. If you are audited, the Board will ask for the certificates and other documents that you used to calculate your credits. 

Steps to Calculate Carryover Credits
Here's how to calculate carryover credit for the current reporting period:
  • First, log in and access your online transcript. You will see the total CLE hours earned in the current reporting period, including the three categories of PR credit--mental health/substance abuse credit, diversity/inclusion credit, and all other PR credit.
  • Then, ask...do I have 30 hours of general MCLE credit, including one hour of mental health/substance abuse credit, one hour of diversity/inclusion credit, and four other hours of PR credit?
    • If you achieved compliance in your current two-year reporting period without applying any carryover credits from the most recent reporting period in the past, you can still add up to 10 hours of allowable carryover hours to your current reporting period’s record. 

          When you do that, the carryover hours will be applied to the current reporting period and your remaining transcript credits are available for carryover to the next reporting period up to a maximum of 10 hours of MCLE credit.

    OR

o If you need more credits to reach the 30 required credits (including the required six approved as PR) for your current two-year reporting period, you can add allowable carryover hours from the most recent reporting period in the past (maximum of 10 carryover hours) to your current transcript.  If any carryover credits are not needed to meet this two-year reporting period’s compliance, those excess hours will be available as carryover to your next reporting period. 

Steps to Add Carryover Credits

1.     Log into your attorney account and click “My MCLE.”
2. Click the green “Add Carryover Credits” button in the Reporting Detail box.
3. Enter the total number of carryover credits you earned in your most recent reporting period. If any of those credits qualified as diversity/inclusion, mental health/substance abuse, or other professional responsibility credits, enter the appropriate number in each of the boxes. 
4. Click “Submit.”

If you earned more than 6 hours of professional responsibility credits, including diversity/inclusion or mental health/substance abuse credits, those excess hours will be credited to your current reporting period as general credits.

If you need to edit the number of carryover credits you entered, click the green “Edit Carryover Credits” button in the Reporting Detail box on your My MCLE page. 

If you do not have a “Add Carryover Credits” button on your My MCLE page, you are not eligible to carry over credit into your current reporting period. For questions about your eligibility, please contact the MCLE Board at 312-924-2420.

Please note that if you elect to earn credits during the grace period (July 1 through October 31 of the reporting year), you cannot carry over any excess credits you earned before June 30 into your next two-year reporting period. Any credits earned during the grace period in excess of what is needed to comply with the previous reporting period’s requirements are not considered carryover as they were earned in the new reporting period that began July 1.

The information in this FAQ applies to all reporting periods ending June 30, 2023 and after. Rule 794(c)(1)(i)-(ii). For carryover questions about the two-year reporting periods ending June 30, 2022 and earlier, please contact the MCLE Board at 312-924-2420.

Newly admitted attorneys have a different calculation for carryover credit. To learn more, please click here.

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