RE5 and RE1 exam cost in 2026: the full picture

The RE5 and the RE1 each cost R1 300 to write. That fee is VAT inclusive, set by the FSCA, charged per examination per candidate, and paid to Moonstone when you book. Study material is a separate cost and it is optional.

One thing to separate before you budget. The R1 300 is a third-party examination fee: Moonstone administers the regulatory examinations and collects it, and none of it goes to PassPath. Preparation is the only part of the total you control.

How much does the RE5 exam cost?

R1 300, VAT inclusive. That is the fee per examination per candidate, set by the FSCA and paid to Moonstone when you register at faisexam.co.za. There is no separate registration charge and no venue fee on top.

Payment has to reach Moonstone within 24 hours of registration or the booking is not confirmed, using the EB invoice number as the reference. Missing that window costs you the seat, not the money. The step-by-step guide to booking the RE5 exam covers registration and payment.

How much is the RE1?

Also R1 300, VAT inclusive. The RE1 is the Key Individual examination and the longer paper, 80 multiple-choice questions against the RE5's 50, but the fee is identical because the FSCA sets a single fee for the regulatory examinations.

If you need both, budget two fees. They are separate examinations, booked and paid for separately. The RE5 exam guide and the RE1 exam guide set out what each paper covers and who needs which.

What does a rewrite cost?

The full R1 300 again, for every attempt. There is no discounted resit, and there is no re-registration fee: you log back in to your Moonstone profile and rebook the next available sitting.

No source sets a cap on attempts, so in principle you can keep paying and keep writing. The binding constraint is your DOFA deadline, which gives a supervised representative two years from their date of first appointment to complete the applicable exam. If you have already failed once, read how to pass the rewrite before paying the next R1 300.

What do study material and exam prep cost?

Anything from nothing to about R4 010. The honest range for paid preparation is about R150 at the cheapest through to about R4 010 for a full academic short course.

At the free end, the FSCA publishes the qualifying criteria the examinations are built on, and the legislation is public. Learn Insurance, trading as License to Skill, also offers free downloadable guides alongside its paid exam assistance. Paid preparation falls into three fairly clear tiers.

Question banks and PDF packs, roughly R150 to R375. RE Exam Buddy is R375 once for a PDF study pack plus WhatsApp support, downloadable indefinitely, with a free mock exam. RE5 Online spans R150 for PDFs up to R2 500 for its fuller self-study and webinar options.

Software and video courses, roughly R369 to R1 390. PassPath sits at the bottom of this band at R369 for RE5. Skillfully is R1 390 including VAT for an 18-lesson video course, about 6.5 hours of content, 365 days of access and R150 cashback on passing.

Facilitated and classroom courses, R2 000 to R4 010. Growth In Motion charges R2 000 plus VAT for a two-day class, face-to-face or over MS Teams, with a printed guide and six practice exams. FAIS Forward Academy is R2 150 online with 250 practice questions, and SA Accounting Academy is R2 500 for a three-month facilitated course. Moonstone Business School is R2 850 including VAT for a 12-month online course, and Milpark Education runs from R820 to R4 010 for an academic short course.

One factual note on that tier. Moonstone Business School is the training arm of Moonstone, the body that administers the examinations. That is useful context when comparing providers, but it does not mean its course gives you an advantage in the exam: every provider works from the same published FSCA qualifying criteria. PassPath has no affiliation with Moonstone either.

Price does not track quality in a straight line. A R2 850 facilitated course and a R375 PDF pack are not a better and a worse version of the same thing. One buys structure and contact time, the other buys reference material you work through alone, and a question-bank app buys repetition and feedback. RE5 study options compared sets the options side by side with the trade-offs, and how to choose RE5 study material works through which format fits which candidate.

PassPath's own prices sit in the middle band, and these are PassPath's figures, not third-party fees. From the pricing page: RE5 access is R369, RE1 access is R469, and both together are R739. Those are launch prices, reduced from standard prices of R599, R699 and R1 199, and the launch figure is what you pay today. Each is a one-time payment with 180 days of access and no auto-renew. Teams pay R329 a seat for RE5 and R429 a seat for RE1, minimum two seats.

What does it really cost to get qualified?

Here is the breakdown, by who gets the money.

Paid to Moonstone, compulsory

RE5 examination fee: R1 300, VAT inclusive, per attempt.

RE1 examination fee: R1 300, VAT inclusive, per attempt.

Rewrite fee: R1 300 again, per attempt, with no re-registration charge.

Certificate or result: no extra charge.

Paid for preparation, your choice

Free option: FSCA qualifying criteria and legislation, plus PassPath's free readiness check. R0.

PassPath RE5: R369 launch price, standard R599, one-time, 180 days access.

PassPath RE1: R469 launch price, standard R699, one-time, 180 days access.

PassPath bundle, RE5 and RE1: R739 launch price, standard R1 199.

Third-party options: about R150 to R4 010 once off, depending on format.

First attempt versus a fail and a rewrite

RE5, passed first time, prepared with PassPath: R1 300 plus R369, so R1 669 in total.

RE5, failed once then passed on the rewrite: R1 300 plus R1 300 in exam fees alone, so R2 600, before you have spent a cent on preparation.

RE1, passed first time, prepared with PassPath: R1 300 plus R469, so R1 769.

Both exams, passed first time, prepared with the bundle: R2 600 plus R739, so R3 339.

The arithmetic makes one point clearly. A single failed attempt costs R1 300, which is more than three times PassPath's RE5 launch price and more than the RE5 and RE1 bundle combined. Preparation is the cheaper half of this budget by a wide margin, and the exam fee is the expensive half you cannot discount. That is the whole argument for not walking in underprepared.

If you are not sure which side of that line you are on, the free readiness check takes about 15 minutes and needs no card. It scores you against every FSCA qualifying criterion the exam tests and returns a readiness score plus a topic-by-topic red-to-green heat map, before you commit R1 300.

How much is the RE5 certificate?

Nothing extra. If you are searching for the price of the RE5 certificate, the number you want is the R1 300 exam fee. There is no issuing charge, no printing fee and no annual renewal fee for the result.

There is no product called an RE5 certificate that you buy. You register, you pay R1 300, you write, and if you meet the pass mark of 66%, which is 33 of 50 correct, the result is issued to you. Moonstone allows a maximum 20 working day lead time from exam to results, often sooner. The same applies to the RE1. What the certificate actually is covers what it proves once you have it.

Hidden costs people forget

The R1 300 is not the whole outlay. Four things land on people unbudgeted.

Getting to a venue. Sittings run at physical venues and coverage is uneven. Gauteng and the Western Cape have the most sittings by a wide margin, so in Limpopo, the North West or the Free State you may be driving further or booking a night away. Check the RE5 exam dates for what is scheduled near you.

Time away from work. Sittings start at 09:00, 09:30 or 13:30 and the RE5 runs for two hours. With travel either side, most candidates lose the better part of a working day, twice over if they fail and rewrite. If you earn commission, that is lost income too.

The DOFA clock. This is the expensive one, because it is not a fee. A supervised representative has two years from their date of first appointment to pass the applicable exam. Miss it and you cannot stay on the FSP's representative register.

The 11 working day registration deadline. Registration closes 11 working days before each sitting, roughly two and a half calendar weeks. That is a planning cost rather than a rand cost: the date you have to act by is 11 working days earlier than the exam date you are counting toward, and leaving it late pushes you to the next sitting.

PassPath is an independent study platform. The RE1 and RE5 are written through Moonstone; PassPath is not affiliated with Moonstone or the FSCA.