How to Renew Your CPIM Certification: Requirements, Points and Deadlines
Read this guide in Arabic: اقرأ بالعربية
Passing CPIM is the hard part. Keeping it is mostly admin, and yet we meet people in Riyadh and Al Khobar every year who let a perfectly good certification lapse because nobody told them the clock was running.
Here is how renewal actually works, what counts, what it costs, and the deadlines that catch people out.
What ASCM asks for
CPIM is maintained rather than re examined. ASCM asks you to earn 75 professional development maintenance points over a five year cycle and to submit a maintenance application at the end of it. There is no second exam, no interview and no logbook to keep in a particular format. You simply need evidence that you stayed active in the profession.
Your cycle starts from the date you certify, not from January, which is the first thing people get wrong. Check your own expiry date in your ASCM account rather than assuming. If you also hold another ASCM credential, the cycles can be aligned so you submit once instead of twice, which is worth a five minute conversation with ASCM support.
How the points are earned
Activities fall into two broad buckets: education, meaning what you learn or teach, and service, meaning what you give back to the profession. At the time of writing the published values look roughly like this, and you should confirm the current table on the ASCM certification maintenance page before you plan around it.
| Activity | Points, at the time of writing |
|---|---|
| Passing another ASCM certification exam | 20 points per exam |
| Completing an ASCM learning system with a score of 80 percent or above | 30 points |
| Education or training you attend | 1 point per hour |
| Education or training you deliver as an instructor | 2 points per hour |
| ASCM conference attendance | 8 points per day, capped at three days |
| Writing for the ASCM magazine or blog | 5 points |
| ASCM membership | Around 6 points per year |
Read that table once and the strategy becomes obvious. Membership alone can carry a large share of the 75 points across five years, and a single additional credential covers a chunk of what is left.
Easy points for professionals in Saudi Arabia
Most of our certified alumni in the Kingdom collect points without noticing, once they know what to log.
- Keep your ASCM membership live. It is the cheapest points per riyal you will find, and it also cuts your exam and maintenance fees.
- Log the training you already attend. In house sessions at Aramco, SABIC, Ma'aden or your own employer count as education hours, and so do supplier led technical workshops and safety or quality programs with genuine learning content.
- Take a second credential. Many CPIM holders in Saudi Arabia move on to Certified Supply Chain Professional or Certified in Logistics, Transportation and Distribution, which advances the career and clears a large block of points at the same time.
- Teach. If you run an internal planning workshop for your team, delivered hours are worth double, and most planning managers do this anyway without ever claiming it.
- Attend conferences and industry events. Supply chain and logistics events in Riyadh and Jeddah have multiplied under Vision 2030, and a two day event is a meaningful block of points.
One practical tip almost nobody follows: create a folder on day one of your cycle and drop every certificate, agenda and attendance email into it as it arrives. Reconstructing five years of evidence in the final month is miserable, and it is the main reason people give up and let the credential go.
Fees and how to submit
Submission is done online through your ASCM account. You enter the activities, attach or retain the supporting evidence, and pay the maintenance application fee. At the time of writing that fee is in the region of USD 75 for ASCM members and USD 150 for non members, which is another reason membership tends to pay for itself. Prices change, so verify before you budget.
A small number of applications are audited, which simply means ASCM asks to see the evidence behind what you claimed. If you kept the folder, an audit takes an afternoon. If you did not, it can take weeks.
Deadlines and what happens if it lapses
The deadline is the end of your five year cycle. Miss it and the certification moves into suspension rather than disappearing on the same day, and you are given a window of about 90 days to get the application in. Sort it out inside that window and you keep the credential.
Let the suspension run past that window and the certification expires. At that point there is no application to make: you would need to sit and pass the current CPIM exam again, which since 1 June 2026 means version 9.0 rather than the version you originally studied. That is an expensive way to save a submission fee.
There is also a middle path many people do not know about. If your certification is suspended, each additional year of suspension adds a further 15 points to what you must submit to be reinstated. Confirm the reinstatement rules directly with ASCM, because this is exactly the kind of detail that gets revised.
If your cycle is closing and you want the points and the career move in one go, our CPIM training in Saudi Arabia and our wider supply chain programs run in Riyadh, Jeddah, Al Khobar and live online. If you are still deciding what the credential is doing for you, our honest take on whether CPIM is worth it in Saudi Arabia is a useful read before you renew, and our CPIM salary article shows what certified planners are earning here.
Frequently asked questions
How often do I need to renew my CPIM certification?
Every five years. ASCM asks for 75 professional development maintenance points across that cycle, plus a maintenance application and fee. The cycle runs from your certification date rather than from the start of a calendar year, so check the expiry date in your ASCM account.
How much does CPIM renewal cost?
At the time of writing the maintenance application fee is around USD 75 for ASCM members and USD 150 for non members. Add whatever you spend on the activities that generate points, although a good share of those are things your employer already pays for. Confirm current fees on the ASCM website.
What happens if my CPIM certification expires?
Missing the deadline puts the certification into suspension, with roughly 90 days to submit the maintenance application and keep it. After that it expires and the only route back is sitting and passing the current CPIM exam again. Each extra year of suspension also adds points to the reinstatement requirement.
Does my employer training in Saudi Arabia count towards CPIM points?
Generally yes, where it has real learning content and you can evidence attendance. In house technical training, supplier workshops and quality or planning programs at Saudi employers are all commonly logged as education hours. Keep the certificate or the attendance confirmation.
Do I have to retake the CPIM exam to renew?
No. Renewal is based on maintenance points, not a repeat exam. The only situation where you sit the exam again is if you let the certification expire completely rather than renewing inside the deadline or the suspension window.
