BrokerExamYou do not book the Level 1 exam with RIBO. Its exam page names two exam providers you register with directly, as that page stood on September 3, 2026, and its Exam Rules of January 15, 2025 call them “the only two RIBO approved exam service providers”. Neither document names an exam date or a calendar of sittings. RIBO’s fee update, effective January 1, 2026, prices the two formats, online and in person, at the same $325. The exam page says results come back from the provider two weeks after your exam date.
The two providers, as RIBO names them
RIBO’s Level 1 exam page puts it under “How to Apply to Write the Exam” and lists the Insurance Institute of Ontario and the Insurance Brokers Association of Ontario. The Exam Rules name the same two providers at rule 1.5, and name the first one differently:
Candidates must register for their RIBO exam(s) directly through the Insurance Institute of Canada (IIC) or the Insurance Brokers Association of Ontario (IBAO). They are the only two RIBO approved exam service providers.
The two RIBO documents give that provider two different names, and neither explains the difference. Both list two providers and no more. The exam page stops at the list; rule 1.5 adds that they are the only two, so there is no third route to the exam.
Your choice reaches past the booking screen. Attempts are counted per provider, and RIBO defers a long list of decisions to whichever one you register with. Rule 7.1 sends candidates to the provider’s own policies for “eligibility, withdrawal, rescheduling, rewrite policy, transfer, absence, technical issues, legal name, failure to book the exam, and accommodations”.
Where the dates are not
Search RIBO’s exam page for an exam date, a season, or a sitting window and you will not find one. The Exam Rules carry none either. Rule 7.1 is as close as they get, and it points away from RIBO, sending rescheduling and failure to book the exam to the provider’s own policies.
RIBO does keep a veto. Rule 1.6 reserves the right for RIBO and its providers to “refuse access to an exam, terminate, pause, postpone, or add conditions for any reason”, giving security concerns, ethical considerations, conflicts in current licensing status and unpaid or disputed exam fees as examples.
Before you book: eligibility and identification
Checking your own eligibility is your job under rule 1.1, and it is due before you register, not after. Anyone holding an active licence, whether an OTL licence or a licence in another jurisdiction, is told to self-check against RIBO’s equivalency criteria; everyone else needs RIBO’s approval to waive the Level 1 requirement before they can write an equivalency exam instead.
Identification is the requirement most likely to cost you a sitting. What you bring has to be “original, valid (non-expired) government-issued photo identification” under rule 1.2, which gives a passport, a Canadian driver’s licence, a Canadian health card and a Canadian permanent resident card as its examples and rules out digital copies and photocopies. The name and date of birth on it must match your registration exactly, per rule 1.3. The triggers differ, failing to produce valid identification under 1.2 and a discrepancy under 1.3, and both attach the same consequence: rescheduling, at your own expense.
The rules turn on who you are and what the room contains, never on the province or country you write from. Take that as silence rather than permission, and ask the provider, since rule 7.1 leaves eligibility, and what happens if you fail to book the exam, to its policies.
Online or in person
Both formats exist, and RIBO’s fee update, effective January 1, 2026, prices them the same: the fee applies “regardless of the exam provider or whether the exam is written online or in-person”. For the rest of the money, see what the exam and the licence cost.
The choice changes the rules you sit under. Section 3 of the Exam Rules applies to virtually proctored exams only, section 4 to in-person ones only, and section 2 applies to both.
Virtually proctored sittings
Section 3 is the longer of the two and reads as a specification for the room:
- The examination area must be free of prohibited materials for the whole exam, breaks included (3.1), and multiple monitors or TV screens are not permitted near it (3.2).
- Your webcam should be positioned to capture your entire face, head and shoulders for the duration (3.8).
- Repeatedly looking off screen, obscuring your face, speaking or whispering in any language, moving out of camera view, and opening anything other than the exam platform are all listed as prohibited (3.3).
- Losing video, audio or screen for more than five minutes terminates the exam and nullifies the result (3.5).
- One break of five minutes or less is allowed with the proctor’s prior approval, and the exam timer keeps running through it (3.6).
- You supply the equipment and the connection, and instability can end the sitting (3.9). Rule 3.10 asks you to run a system check before the scheduled time.
Know rule 3.4 in advance. Rescheduling for a technical problem at your end, software incompatibility aside, is allowed, may carry a rescheduling fee, and does not count as an attempt.
In-person sittings
Section 4 is four rules, and three of them are about the clock. Be there no later than 15 minutes before the start time (4.1). Turn up late and how late decides everything: under 30 minutes and you write with no extra time, 30 minutes or more and you may not write at all (4.2). Once you are in, the first 30 minutes are a lock-in, because 4.3 bars you from leaving the room inside them. Belongings and conduct are left to the exam centre and the provider (4.4).
Rules that apply either way
Only the registered examinee may write (2.1). Food is barred from the examination area and drinks have to be in a clear, unmarked container (2.10 and 2.11). Leaving the area needs the proctor’s permission, and an unauthorised break terminates the exam (2.12). Non-essential head coverings, watches and sunglasses come off (2.16). Is the RIBO Level 1 exam open book has the short list of what you may consult while writing.
Attempts are counted per provider
RIBO’s exam page and rule 2.20 say the same thing: candidates may write twice per exam provider, and a second failure with the same provider brings an 8-month waiting period, which resets if you write during it. Rule 2.18 sets a two-week wait after any failed attempt. What to do after failing the RIBO Level 1 works through both, and why a multiple-choice paper gets no remark.
Results
The exam page gives the timing and the address for chasing it:
Upon completion of the RIBO exam, results will be provided to you by the exam provider two weeks after your exam date. Please contact your exam provider directly for your results, not RIBO.
Neither the exam page nor the Exam Rules says what the result report holds. Rule 1.4 covers one edge case: if your score report is issued in a name other than your legal name, you must request a new one from your exam service provider, verified against your government-issued ID, and service fees may apply.
Accommodation
Section 8 opens with RIBO’s own commitment to accommodating different needs, then requires the providers to “make every effort to accommodate examinees with documented disabilities/impairment or needs relating to a protected ground”. Rule 8.2 routes the request to your exam service provider: a request form and, “if applicable”, supporting documentation, “in accordance with the Exam Service Provider’s policies”.
Booking in order
Read the eligibility and identification rules first, because both can cost you a sitting after you have paid. Then pick a provider knowing that attempts are counted against it. Decide online or in person on the conditions rather than the price, which is the same either way, and read how the RIBO Level 1 exam is built before you pick a date. Withdrawal, transfer and absence run on the provider’s own policies under rule 7.1, so read the provider’s terms in the same sitting you book in.