In January 2023, the state legislature approved an additional $10 million to the Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation (IDFPR) for a new licensing system, which was last upgraded in 1999. Secretary Mario Treto testified to the House Appropriations committee on the evening of February 22nd that IDFPR is “currently in works of negotiating the contract” and “expending the $10 million within this fiscal year (June 2023)”
Beyond the initial state appropriation to implement the new licensing system, Secretary Treto did admit that fees collected from applicant users of the platform “are going to be the operational revenue for the licensing system.” For reference, Secretary Treto testified that the state agency’s minimum cost to offer the platform to the public “is one dollar per license type per month to be on the system.”
While Secretary Treto did not provide an estimated timeline for implementation of the new licensing system, he did state that “implementing the transition and migration onto the new system is going to be a three phased approach,” with healthcare professionals being the focus of “phase one”; another factor highlighted by Secretary Treto is the month and year a license is set for renewal pursuant to state law. The association will work to position the beauty industry for transition into the new licensing system as soon as possible.
Once implemented, Secretary Treto testified that they anticipate licenses will be processed in less than one week with full accessibility to the user in a dashboard platform to better understand the status of an application.
According to Secretary Treto, when he began in his position in April 2021, the average processing time for all professions under IDFPR was 10-12 weeks and is currently an average of 6-8 weeks. Secretary Treto did also note that of the 564 employees budgeted for IDFPR, there are 122 vacancies, but that they continue to work on more rapid response times as the new licensing system is being implemented.
Please CLICK HERE to submit any license issues you have with the Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation.