New Mandatory Trust CLE Hour Available Online

Members of the North Carolina State Bar can now access an online, interactive, one-hour trust account management continuing legal education course on the North Carolina Bar Association’s website. The program, a joint project of the North Carolina State Bar and the North Carolina Bar Association, provides the most current explanation of the management duties for a lawyer’s trust account, and satisfies the provision in Rule 1.15-2(s) of the Rules of Professional Conduct requiring anyone with trust account signatory authority to complete a one-hour trust account management CLE course. The one-hour module on trust accounting basics is the first in an anticipated series of high quality online trust account management programs produced by the North Carolina Bar Association and the State Bar and sponsored in part by Lawyers Mutual Insurance Company and Old Republic National Title Insurance Company.

Note: Any lawyer or supervised employee with check signing authority must take a one-hour trust account management CLE course approved by the State Bar for this purpose. To allow CLE providers time to develop and obtain approval for appropriate courses and to allow a reasonable time for all law firms to come into compliance, the CLE requirement may be satisfied in 2017; however, compliance with the other signature requirements for trust account checks should be prompt. Completion of a one-hour trust accounting CLE course taught by the State Bar’s trust account compliance counsel after January 1, 2015, satisfies the requirement.