Annual Registration Renewal in Ireland: Fees and Deadlines Compared

Registration renewal fees and deadlines for all six regulators

Ireland has no single renewal date for health professionals. Each regulator runs its own register under its own Act, with its own fee year, its own portal and its own sequence of reminders, late fees and removal. If you hold more than one registration, you have more than one deadline to manage.

The table below is the centrepiece of this guide. It shows the current cycle for every regulator covered by our regulator guides, with a jump link to the detailed section for each one. All figures are for the 2026 registration year unless stated otherwise.

• Medical Council
• NMBI
• PSI
• Dental Council
• CORU
• PHECC

Two patterns stand out. Lapsing costs far more than renewing: an NMBI registrant who lapses pays €350 to come back, against €100 to renew. And the law builds in fair notice. The Medical Practitioners Act 2007 and the Nurses and Midwives Act 2011 both require a reminder and a waiting period before removal for non-payment, and both stop the regulator removing a registrant for non-payment while a complaint against them is still open.

Medical Council annual retention fee, ARAF and declarations

All doctors practising medicine in Ireland must be registered with the Medical Council and must renew annually by submitting the Annual Retention Application Form (ARAF) with the relevant fee through the online Doctors Portal. Forms and fees are due on or before 30 June, and the Council is clear that it cannot defer, extend, freeze, pause or put a registration on hold. The registration year runs from 1 July to 30 June, so the 2026 retention covers 1 July 2026 to 30 June 2027.

The Council emails every doctor when they are due to renew, and its fees page notes that the 2026 retention process opened in late May 2026. The form sits at the top of your portal homepage and under "Outstanding Tasks". Fees are not processed without a completed form, so paying alone does not renew you. Doctors completing their intern year, and Supervised Division doctors who have completed two years, do not complete the ARAF.

Retention fees for 2026 and 2027

In 2026 the Medical Council began a phased increase: 10% in 2026 and a further 10% in 2027. It states that the last change to annual retention fees was in 2015, and it cites growing registration volumes, expanded statutory responsibilities and rising operational costs.

Payment is by credit or debit card online. Direct debit and split payments are not available for retention fees, although the Council says it is investigating them. A paper form can be requested from the Registration Section, with a €30 administrative fee for postal forms, and an Irish-language form is available on request.

Doctors on maternity, adoptive or surrogacy leave, or on sick leave lasting more than six months, can claim a 50% reduction once the full fee has been paid for the current registration year. You email the refund form for your leave type, with evidence such as a letter from your doctor, your employer or the Department of Social Protection, to the Council.

What you declare on the ARAF

The ARAF is a legal declaration, not just a payment screen. The questions that most often cause difficulty are these:

• Question 1, professional competence. General, Supervised and Specialist Division doctors declare that they are enrolled in a Professional Competence Scheme for 2026/27 (enrolment is due by 1 August) and that they met the annual minimum CPD requirement for 2025/26, which is 50 hours including a practice review. Doctors who are not compliant are encouraged to tick "No". Trainee Specialist Division doctors do not need to enrol and declare accordingly.
• Question 2, professional indemnity. You select the practice arrangement that applies on the day you submit. Doctors in private practice must provide an individually named certificate showing continuous cover from the submission date and for the 2026–27 registration year; those practising only in HSE or publicly affiliated facilities covered by the State's Clinical Indemnity Scheme do not upload one. NCHDs were not required to provide a certificate for the 2026 ARAF.
• Convictions. The form also asks about convictions; answer it accurately, taking account of the rules on spent convictions.

You do not send your Statement of Participation with the form. Instead, the Council monitors compliance through Question 1, quality-checks declarations against professional competence scheme data, and may ask for proof of enrolment or a Statement of Participation. It warns that an inaccurate declaration may lead to a complaint. If your CPD year fell short, our guide to Medical Council PCS audit and non-compliance explains what that means and which exemptions exist.

Doctors based overseas who will not practise in Ireland for more than 30 days between 1 May 2026 and 30 April 2027, and who maintain their competence overseas, need not enrol in an Irish scheme, but must say so on the form and send an Overseas Practice Declaration to the Council. Doctors planning their next PCS year often find that ordinary clinical work can be evidenced well; our Work-Based Learning and Professional Competence course covers how to record it, though only your scheme decides what it accepts.

If a doctor misses 30 June

The consequences arrive in a set order, and the Council's Unregistered Practice Policy (version 1.9, approved June 2025) describes them:

1. 1 July: late fee

   If the retention fee is unpaid and no completed form has been received by 1 July, a €50 late payment fee applies.

2. Reminder notice and 21 days

   Under section 79 of the Medical Practitioners Act 2007, the Council may remove a doctor who has not paid, but not earlier than 21 days after a reminder has been sent to the registered address. The power cannot be used while a complaint against the doctor is unresolved.

3. Removal and notification

   All removals are notified to the Minister for Health and the HSE, and notices may be published on the Council's website where that is in the public interest.

4. Restoration within six months

   Under section 80, the chief executive must restore a doctor removed only for non-payment who applies within six months of the date the fee became due and pays the appropriate fees. The restoring application fee is €230, on top of the annual fee. After six months, the policy says the application is treated as a new application.

A separate clock runs for indemnity. If proof is not provided within 14 days of the registration certificate, the Council allows a further 21 days, and a doctor whose proof is still missing 35 days after the certificate issues is removed. Practising while unregistered is an offence, and under section 42(1) an unregistered doctor generally cannot recover fees for services given while unregistered.

If you know you will not practise in Ireland after 30 June, voluntary withdrawal through your online account is the cleaner route. It takes effect immediately and you pay no retention fee while withdrawn. To restore later you apply online, pay the restoral fee and annual fee, and send a copy of your passport plus a certificate of good standing from any other jurisdiction where you were registered in the past five years. More on registration and competence for doctors is in our Medical Council guide.

NMBI annual renewal: MyNMBI, the €100 fee and 31 January

Nurses and midwives practising in Ireland must be on the Register and pay the annual renewal fee each year. For the 2026 registration year, renewal ran from 4 November 2025 to 31 January 2026, online only at MyNMBI. The annual retention fee is €100. Student nurses and midwives do not renew, and anyone first registered on or after 1 September 2025 does not need to renew until the 2027 cycle.

What the MyNMBI renewal asks you

NMBI's renewal guide sets out eight steps:

1. Overview of the process.
2. Personal details, including confirming that you have read NMBI's privacy notice.
3. Address.
4. Phone number.
5. Divisions: whether you are practising in each division and whether you deal directly with patients.
6. Employment details: primary job title and primary workplace, with end dates for posts you have left.
7. Declaration.
8. Payment of €100 by debit or credit card (your bank may require strong customer authentication). NMBI does not take renewal payments by phone.

The declaration confirms that you are not the subject of any relevant proceedings pending or in progress in Ireland, with the same declaration required for any other jurisdiction, and that the information you have given is complete, accurate and true. Section 53 of the Nurses and Midwives Act 2011, as amended, requires you to keep your register details correct and up to date. Employment details are collected for statistical records under section 46(9) of the Act and S.I. No. 503 of 2020, and NMBI says they are reported anonymously.

Log in with the email address the renewal notice was sent to and use "Forgotten Password" rather than creating a new account. Agency staff enter the agency's details. Your certificate appears in "My Documents" within about 30 minutes.

When a nurse or midwife does not renew

NMBI describes the sequence plainly. Registrants who neither renew nor voluntarily remove themselves are placed on the list the Board considers for removal under section 77(1). Section 77 allows removal for failure to pay a fee only "not earlier than 28 days" after a reminder has been sent to the registered address, and not while a complaint or inquiry is outstanding. For the 2026 cycle, the Board confirmed removals at its meeting on 18 February 2026, and notices went to the registrants concerned, known employers and the HSE. NMBI's renewal page adds that notice of removal goes to the Minister for Health as well, under section 82.

NMBI also states that nurses and midwives who practise in Ireland must by law be on the Register, and that practice includes clinical work, management, education and research. Renewal is your responsibility, not your employer's.

Section 78 obliges the chief executive to restore a registrant removed only under section 77 who applies within six months of the date the fee became due and pays the appropriate fees. NMBI's own wording is that restoration requires the €250 fee plus the annual renewal fee and that you must meet the restoration requirements in place when you apply. If you are going on a career break, retiring or moving abroad, NMBI recommends voluntary removal, free during the renewal period, from one or all divisions, because lapsing can mean higher restoration fees later. You must select every division to be fully removed.

NMBI does not yet enforce a mandatory CPD hours requirement at renewal, because Part 11 of the 2011 Act has not been commenced. Our NMBI guide and our article on the NMBI competence scheme pilot explain where that stands. In the meantime the Code of Professional Conduct and Ethics still expects you to keep your knowledge current, and our Professionalism and Professional Standards for Nurses and Midwives course works through the Code's six principles.

PSI continued registration: fees and deadlines for pharmacists

The PSI does not use one national renewal date for pharmacists. Each registration certificate has its own expiry date, and the continued registration application opens 60 days before that date, when the PSI emails you. You cannot apply earlier, and you must submit before the expiry date. Failing to submit by expiry starts the cancellation process and removal from the Register.

On the application you declare your CPD undertakings, state whether you are in a patient-facing role (which feeds into practice review eligibility under the CPD processes), and answer questions about convictions and prohibitions elsewhere that bear on your fitness to practise, subject to the spent-convictions guidance. Payment is online by card only.

New PSI fees from 1 May 2026

The PSI's new statutory Fees Rules were signed on 20 April 2026 and apply to applications received from 1 May 2026. The PSI says its fees had not increased in 17 years, and the increase is phased over 2026 to 2028.

The late fee applies to any application submitted less than 30 days before expiry, cannot be removed once applied, and must be paid before the application is processed. Instalments are not possible.

If your registration is cancelled for non-payment, you can apply for restoration within six months of the fee due date; after six months you must go through first-time registration. Voluntary cancellation takes effect as soon as you submit it, and restoration after voluntary cancellation scales with time away, from CPD records for gaps under six months to a Core Competency Framework self-assessment and at least four weeks of practical training for gaps over three years. Under section 59 of the Pharmacy Act 2007, voluntary cancellation may not be possible while a Part 6 complaint is outstanding.

Dental Council annual retention fee: dentists in January, auxiliaries in August

The Dental Council runs two retention years. Dentists and dental specialists register from 1 February to 31 January, and auxiliary dental workers from 1 September to 31 August.

Dentists and dental specialists

Renewal notices for 2026 issued on 12 November 2025. The 2026 annual retention fee is €450 for dentists, up from €380 in 2025, and specialists pay €830 in total, because they pay the €380 specialist fee on top of the dentist fee and must stay on the Register of Dentists to remain on the Register of Dental Specialists. For 2027 the Council says only a cost-of-living level increase is planned.

Pay by 31 January to keep your name on the register. If the fee is not paid within two months of the renewal date, a €300 late fee applies; the Council's own example is a dentist paying after 1 April who owes €750 in total. Continued non-payment can lead to erasure under section 39(1)(b) of the Dentists Act 1985. Section 39 requires written notice of the decision, gives the dentist 21 days to apply to the High Court to cancel it, and otherwise allows the Council to seek High Court confirmation. An erased name can be restored only by direction of the Council. Restoring after a High Court erasure means paying the outstanding annual retention fee, the late fee, a restoration fee and any costs awarded to the Council by the courts.

Auxiliary dental workers

The 2026–2027 retention fee was due by 31 August 2026: clinical dental technicians €60, dental hygienists €40, orthodontic therapists €35 and dental nurses €20. Failing to pay suspends your name from the register, and practising while suspended as a hygienist, orthodontic therapist or clinical dental technician is an offence. The dental nurse register is voluntary, but only registered dental nurses may take dental radiographs under a dentist's prescription after an approved radiography course. Restoring after suspension means paying the outstanding annual retention fee and a registration application fee, and the Council's restoration page warns that backdated fees may be owed.

If you are leaving practice in Ireland, the Council asks you to resign in writing by letter or email, and it replies within five working days. Allow about three months for restoration, and do not book patients until you have written confirmation. More on dental regulation is in our Dental Council guide.

CPD is not yet a statutory condition of retention for dentists, but legislation to make it one is being prepared: see our guide to statutory CPD for dentists in Ireland.

CORU renewal dates by profession

CORU registrants renew on the anniversary of the opening of their profession's register, so the date depends on which register you are on:

The fee is €100, paid by card through the Registrant Portal under "Renewal and Restoration". Reminder emails go out six weeks before the renewal date, and only the registrant can complete the declaration; an employer cannot do it for you.

If the fee is not paid, the Council may, at its discretion, direct the Registration Board to remove your name under section 40(1) of the Health and Social Care Professionals Act 2005. Section 40(3) then requires the Council to notify the HSE, your employer where known, any other appropriate persons and the public, and CORU publishes removals for non-payment on its website, updated monthly. Section 40(2) allows restoration within six months of the date the fee fell due. CORU's renewal notices, such as the one for physiotherapists, state that this means completing a restoration application within six months of the renewal date and paying a €50 restoration fee plus the €100 annual renewal fee, and CORU's general restoration procedure lists the same €50 plus €100 for removal for non-payment. After six months, no restoration process is available. CORU's advice is to apply for voluntary removal rather than let registration lapse: registrants who remove themselves voluntarily and restore within two years pay a reduced €30 restoration fee on top of the renewal fee.

PHECC registration renewal for EMTs and paramedics

Every PHECC-registered practitioner must apply each year to renew their licence, online or on paper on request. Notification comes 12 weeks before expiry, and the administrative deadline is four weeks before expiry.

The fee is €10 for all grades. Applying in the last four weeks before expiry costs €20 in total (the €10 fee plus a €10 late fee). On the last day of the licence, anyone who has not re-registered is placed on the Inactive Register and is no longer authorised to implement PHECC Clinical Practice Guidelines or to administer medications under the relevant statutory instruments. Restoration within one month of expiry costs €50; after one month it costs €100 and requires a letter to the Registrar explaining the reasons, with a CV. PHECC's registration page lists its Declaration & Commitment, Code of Professional Conduct and Ethics and Registration Rules (all 2017) as the documents that underpin registration. Our PHECC guide covers CPD.

Keeping your clinical competence evidence in order matters alongside re-registration; our guide on writing a PHECC CPC case study covers structure, CPG reasoning and reflection.

Why registration renewals go wrong, and how to avoid removal

Removals follow every renewal cycle, and most lapses come from a handful of avoidable slips rather than a decision not to renew.

A renewal checklist that works for any register

Tick these off before your window opens.

• Put your regulator's deadline in your calendar, with a reminder two weeks before (and before the late-fee point for the PSI, Dental Council and PHECC).
• Check the email address, postal address and phone number on your account; reminders and removal notices go to them.
• Confirm you can log in and reset your password before the window opens, not on the last evening.
• Have a card ready that supports online authentication; most portals take card payments only.
• Gather what the declarations depend on: PCS enrolment and Statement of Participation (doctors), indemnity certificate (doctors in private practice), current job details (nurses and midwives), CPD records (pharmacists), declaration answers (CORU).
• Read every declaration and answer it accurately, including any question on proceedings or convictions.
• Download your certificate and check the public register shows you as registered.
• If you are leaving practice, use voluntary withdrawal or resignation before the deadline rather than letting registration lapse.

Checked against the official sources above in October 2026. Rules and fees change, so confirm current requirements with your regulator or scheme.