Applicants who complete the FCVS verification process establish a permanent, lifetime portfolio of primary-source verified credentials – allowing quick, easy and inexpensive access to medical credentials. These documents can be used throughout the applicants's career for state licensure, hospital privileges, employment and professional memberships. This service is especially valuable to those physicians graduating from medical school outside the U.S. or Canada, where verification is often time consuming, costly and difficult. It is also extremely useful for those applicants whose postgraduate training programs have closed.

FCVS can expedite the process for future licensure. The Initial Application process can take some time to complete (see below); however, once the profile has been completed, the time to forward subsequent requests are significantly shorter, which will assist in obtaining future medical license more expediently.

A number of medical boards require submission of an FCVS Physician Profile as a condition for licensure. By submitting for FCVS services now, you will place yourself in the best possible position for obtaining future licensure in any state.

Currently, there are 61 medical and/or osteopathic boards that accept the FCVS Physician Profile. Of these, 11 boards require the use of our service for licensure. A list of boards that accept our Physician and Physician Assistant profiles is available to view on this website.

The total fees of FCVS usage vary from applicant to applicant, dependent upon the information required for the file. An initial application fee entitles the applicant to have a personalized Profile created and sent to one recipient. The base fee is $295 (physician) or $145 (physician assistant) , with an additional $50 fee for physician applications NOT submitted online. Additional surcharges may apply to cover costs incurred to collect examination transcripts, ECFMG certification (if applicable) and other miscellaneous verification fees.

The subsequent Profile (any profile sent subsequent to your initial profile) carries a significantly lesser cost, with a base fee of $90 (physician) or $35 (physician assistant), with an additional $25 fee for physician applications NOT submitted online. Additional surcharges may apply to cover costs incurred to collect examination transcripts, ECFMG certification (if applicable) and other miscellaneous verification fees.

Additional profiles (the physician's profile sent to additional state medical boards, hospitals or health care entities at the same time as an Initial or Subsequent profile) are available for $60 each plus any additional surcharges.

The initial requests for information are sent to your medical school, postgraduate training institutions, and (if necessary) to you, within 3-4 weeks from receipt of your online documentation. If you have provided international express information and your school is located outside of the United States, it will be sent using your express account. (FCVS recommends that all physicians who graduated from an international medical school authorize FCVS to use Federal Express or DHL to make their requests.) All U.S. medical schools, postgraduate training institutions requests and letters to you are sent via U.S. Postal Service or via email.

The initial request for information is sent to your medical school within the first 30 days of processing.

For international medical schools, the second request is made 60 days after the first request and any additional requests at 30 day intervals. However, the designation of your file and the location of your medical school will dictate the total number of requests sent to your medical school. All requests are made using regular mail. FCVS recommends that all international graduates provide a Federal Express or DHL account for making these requests/and receiving the verifications via courier service. This allows FCVS and you to track the shipment. Use of a courier service can reduce the amount of time required to obtain the necessary verifications.

A total of THREE requests will be scheduled; if, after these three attempts, the necessary verification is not received, your file is forwarded to our archives until your medical school responds to our requests. In these situations, you may rest assured that FCVS will contact you and outline procedural options that may increase the chances of verification response.

For domestic medical schools, the second request is made 30 days after the first request and any additional requests are sent at 14 day intervals until the necessary verification is received.

For processing to begin, FCVS requires a number of supporting documents and completed release forms mailed by the applicant to our offices. This does include FCVS online application submissions. Until this paperwork is received, work cannot begin on the file (as crucial verification information is supplied which your application does not provide).

The list of documents required by FCVS is as follows:

1. Certified Birth Certificate (i.e., certified by the issuing institution), OR
   Original Passport (must be current and valid) with explanation as to why an original birth certificate cannot be supplied. A passport submission will incur an additional $25 shipping/handling fee so that we may return this to you via overnight mail.
2. If necessary-Documentation (or explanation) of Use of Alternate Name Form (should submitted name/name on medical school documents differ from name on identity document used above; located in application packet)
3. 8.5" x 11" photocopy of medical school diploma
4. If necessary - Photocopy of Fifth Pathway Certificate
5. If necessary - Fifth Pathway Program Form (located in application packet)
6. If necessary - Photocopy of ECFMG Certificate
7. Completed and Notarized Affidavit and Release from Applicant Form (located in application packet)
8. Authorization and Release of Information, Documents and Records Form (located in application packet)
9. If necessary - NBME Examination History release (located in application packet)
10. Photocopies of medical education documents (i.e., transcripts, compulsory internship certificates, etc.) - primarily applies to international graduate applicants
11. If U.S. graduate applicant, Medical School Release Request Form (located in application packet)

For any documents that are listed as "located in application packet" and apply to your profile, copies can be downloaded from this website if you do not already have them. Please note that not all documents will necessarily be required, as some documents do not apply to certain physician circumstances. Once obtained, you can mail your supporting documents to FCVS (see address information here).

FCVS recommends the use of a courier service such as FedEx, DHL, Airborne Express. (DO NOT USE U.S. POSTAL SERVICE OF ANY KIND). You may send the passport and your written statement to our address (see address information here).

There is a $25 shipping and handling fee required for the return of passports; DO NOT SEND ANY FEES WITH YOUR PASSPORT. Instead, mail the fee, with a cover letter explaining the fee as payment for your passport, to our 'lockbox' address (see address information here).

Once your passport has been received, FCVS requires approximately seven to 10 business days to process it. It will then be returned to you via Federal Express to the mailing address provided in your application, or an alternate address, which you can provide via written statement.

If you were born in the United States, you may obtain any number of certified birth certificates from the appropriate issuing government agency. For further information on this and address information on the various agencies, please access www.vitalrec.com. [Your certified birth certificate will not be returned to you; it becomes a permanent part of your FCVS file.]

If you are an international applicant, you may include a written statement with your birth certificate requesting that it be returned to you and the reason for the request. This will incur a $25 shipping and handling fee to pay for the return of your birth certificate via Federal Express, which you may include with the birth certificate in the form of check or money order made out to FCVS. You can mail the certificate and fees to FCVS via our 'lockbox' address (see address information here).

To create an online account, please point your browser to online logon screen at http://fcvs.fsmb.org and click the link "Become a New User." You may then enter your e-mail address as your logon ID and create a password of your choice.

To access the FCVS online system (the means by which you may use the FCVS online application, or check status of your file once processing has begun), an FCVS online account is needed. If you have not created one previously, you will need to create one. Please keep in mind that this account is for access to the online system only; no personal or file information is permanently associated with it, and changes to your file will not affect it in any way.

Please take note of both your logon ID and password. If you lose or forget your password, it can be provided to you via e-mail. Send an e-mail to fcvs@fsmb.org with your logon ID and a reply will be sent with your password. However, our online account system is not searchable by password; if you forget your logon ID, a new account will need to be created.

Your FCVS Packet ID is assigned to your file once your application and payment is received. This number is a permanent designation for your file and will be used for both the Initial application and all subsequent uses of FCVS. This number is separate from your FCVS Order ID, which is a temporary number assigned to online applications which are submitted without payment.

An acknowledgement letter is sent to the applicant in the course of the initial processing of the file providing the packet ID (in the case of online application submission, this acknowledgement is sent via e-mail within 24 hours of submission and payment). Additionally, any correspondence sent to you from FCVS after your application is received will have your packet ID located in the RE: lines. If you do not have your packet ID and wish to know it, you may request it via e-mail from fcvs@fsmb.org. Please ensure that your e-mail includes your name as it appears on your application, your Social Security Number, and your date of birth so that we may match your request directly with your file and provide you with the correct information.

Once you have submitted your application and payment, please wait approximately 30 days before contacting FCVS to obtain a formal status update. This is due to the fact that during this time, your file is in the initial application processing stages. FCVS verifies that your application has been completed correctly and that the documents mailed meet FCVS processing standards; we enter all information; and (in the latter part of the this time) generate and mail the initial requests for information to your medical school and postgraduate training institutions.

You do have access to check your application online with your packet ID number, but due to the reasons cited above, your application checklist is likely to show many items (including items received from you, or fees paid) as either "Incomplete" or "Not Received." As the initial application processing continues, these items will be marked as "Complete". Additionally, inquiries via telephone to FCVS customer service can confirm receipt of your application and provide your packet ID, but it cannot be reported with accuracy what, if any, further information is needed.

There are a number of reasons which may account for why paperwork supplied to FCVS may continue to show as "Incomplete" or "Not Received" on the online application checklist. These possible reasons are as follows:

1. The paperwork may not be checked into the system - Due to volume, all mail received by FCVS (regardless of method of mailing used) may take up to five business days to be entered and/or processed into the system as received. This means that documents may have physically arrived at our address but have yet to be checked in as such that we can confirm receipt. Please check back with FCVS customer service in a few days after your initial call to confirm receipt.
2. Your analyst may not have had time to review the paperwork - When paperwork is received from any source, in addition to data entry into the system it must be reviewed by the analyst assigned to your file. This is especially true in cases where the information must come from the applicant themselves, as sometimes the responses are clarifications of information already provided. Also, please note that FCVS analysts are individually responsible for the processing of a significant number of physician files, all of which are given the same high level of priority. Physician files must be done on a scheduled, rotational basis to allow maximum fairness, efficiency and attention to ALL files. FCVS customer service can often confirm the receipt of the paperwork; you may rest assured that your analyst will be processing the information as soon as is possible. If there is some kind of special or extenuating circumstance, you will be transferred directly to your analyst so that detailed discussion of your file can be had.
3. The information is complete, but needs a date of completion entered - on the FCVS online application checklist, a listing will regularly be found under both Applicant-Provided and Source-Provided information that reads 'Complete - Not Received'. If no other information under the source heading shows as "Incomplete" or "Not Received", this means that the only item listed outstanding is a Date of Verification Completion, which is entered by FCVS before the file is sent for final processing and mailing. In this case, the verification for that source is otherwise complete.
4. ECMFG Certification - there are a number of medical boards for which FCVS processes an ECFMG Status Report (most state boards obtain an ECFMG Confirmation Report) to provide certification. For these files, the request for certification is sent to ECFMG, and the certification is sent directly to the board (without coming to FCVS). In cases like this, your online application checklist will show ECFMG certification as incomplete when in fact it is not. Please ask FCVS customer service for further information.

If there are no technical difficulties with either the site or internet connection and you have entered all information needed for status check correctly, the reason may be due to lack of designation of recipient of your Profile. The website link is set up by state board or hospital code. If your file does not have a recipient (state board) designated, no data can be transmitted to the website. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause. Until a state board or hospital is designated (see more information here) for your file, you may check the status by contacting FCVS customer service.

The initial requests for information are sent to your medical school, postgraduate training institutions, and (if necessary) to you in the latter half of the first 30 days of processing your file. If you have provided international express information and your school is located outside of the United States, it will be sent using your account. The U.S. medical school, postgraduate training institutions requests and letters to you are sent via U.S. Postal Service (in some circumstances, the letter to you may be sent via e-mail; this is done at the discretion of you and your analyst).

If no response is received, FCVS begins to schedule additional requests on approximately 30-day intervals. All additional requests to your medical school are sent via U.S. Postal Service; if your school is located outside of the U.S., each request can be sent using your international express mail account if you sent prior written consent do so. After the first attempt, contact with your postgraduate training institutions is normally conducted via telephone call and fax.

As to the number of requests made, contact will continue to be made or attempted to your postgraduate training institutions until the necessary verification is received. The handling of requests sent to your medical school is more complex; please find more information here.

Please keep in mind that once all necessary verification has been received for your file, FCVS will proceed with processing. This is important to note due to the fact that not all medical boards may require full verification for the Physician Profile to be submitted. If your file is processed, completed, and mailed without full verification of any source, additional requests to complete the file are sent each time an FCVS Subsequent Request Application (more information here) is received. Whether the information requested is a submission requirement of the designee stated in the application will dictate whether the receipt of the information is required before your file can be completed.

As stated before, the initial request for information is sent to your medical school within the first 30 days of processing, and additional attempts to obtain information are made at approximately 30-day intervals. However, where you have designated your file to be sent and where your medical school is located will dictate the total number of requests scheduled to your medical school. Requests will continue at 30 day intervals for U.S. based medical schools until the necessary verification is received. For internationally based medical schools, a total of THREE requests will be scheduled; if, after these three attempts, the necessary verification is not received, your file is forwarded to our archives until such time that the school responds to our requests. In these situations, you may rest assured that FCVS will contact you and outline procedural options that may increase the chances of verification response.

No. To provide the complete assurance that all FCVS verification is true and accurate, the state boards that accept our service require that all requests to all sources be sent directly to those sources and the responses received directly from them. Any handling of the paperwork by third parties (other than the mail carriers) invalidates the information. Moreover, the verification sent must be in response to FCVS' request; any paperwork mailed by a medical school or postgraduate training institution prior to our request for information cannot be used.

However, please keep in the mind that it is not considered interference if the applicant (or an applicant-designated third party) chooses to contact any institute and encourage them to complete the information and send the response to FCVS. This is neither a requirement nor an expectation on the part of FCVS for the applicant, but is left entirely to the applicant's discretion.

Your FCVS analyst can be available to you to answer specific questions regarding the processing of your file. Below are a number of guidelines that FCVS asks that you follow to be able to get maximum assistance on your file:

1. Ask your question to FCVS Customer Service before requesting your analyst. FCVS Customer Service staff are trained, equipped, and happy to answer a wide variety of FCVS questions, and can often assist even with specific questions regarding your file. If you call, please give your customer service representative the opportunity to assist you. If the question requires more information than what the representative has available, or extenuating circumstances apply to your file, your analyst will then be consulted.
2. Please allow approximately 60 days from receipt of your initial application before requesting to speak to your analyst. In the first 30 days, your file will be undergoing the initial application processing (see information here outlining this process further) and there is little specific information that is available for your file. After this, the file will be assigned to an analyst and the initial requests for information mailed, but responses may not yet have been received. By allowing approximately 60 days, you allow your file to have the maximum amount of opportunity for responses to arrive and verification to be processed.
3. Please wait until after 11:00AM Central Standard Time to ask to speak to your analyst. While FCVS offices open at 8:00AM CST, analysts are recommended to reserve the time from 8:00 to 11:00 for uninterrupted work and processing of the files under their responsibility. During this time, you may be offered the opportunity to leave a voicemail message for your analyst, which will be returned.
4. If you do leave a voicemail message, please wait for a response from your analyst. FCVS analysts are simultaneously responsible for a significant number of files; it may take some time for your analyst to return your message. However, you may rest assured that ALL files are considered equally important and that your message will be returned by your analyst in a timely fashion.

FCVS Customer Service may not give out an analyst's direct telephone extension, but can provide you with their e-mail address so that you can send your question to them directly.

To update any contact information for your file (such as mailing and/or permanent address, telephone and/or fax number, or e-mail address), you may provide a written statement with your new information via e-mail to fcvs@fsmb.org. Upon receipt, your file will be updated accordingly.

To update any other information, if the file is completed you may wait to provide the update via submission of an FCVS Subsequent Request Application (more information is available on subsequent requests here). If the update affects the immediate processing of your file, however (i.e., the addition of information such as postgraduate training you had forgotten to provide on the Initial Application), please contact FCVS Customer Service so that we may outline how you may provide what is needed in a timely fashion.

If your FCVS file has not yet been completed and you wish to change intended recipient information, you will need to submit one of two forms to FCVS:

1. If your file is marked as "Undecided" and you wish to add a designee, or have designated one recipient and wish to add another, you will need to submit an FCVS Profile Designation Form.
2. If you have already designated your recipient and wish to change it to another (or remove it entirely, changing your file to 'Undecided' status), you will need to submit an FCVS Profile Designation Change Form.

Please contact our Customer Service Department at our toll free number 1-888-275-3287 to obtain the correct form.

Please note: A change of designation incurs a $15 fee, which will need to be sent with the Profile Designation Change Form. Moreover, the addition of multiple designees will also incur fees to cover cost of additional profiles and to obtain additional EBAHR transcripts and ECFMG certification (if applicable). You will be notified of the specific costs, and these will need to be paid, before your file can be completed and mailed.

Also, keep in mind the processing time of a file when making a decision regarding designation change. A file may have a change of designation at any time up to the point where the Profile is mailed; however, if submitted after final processing has begun, there is the chance that delays could occur in the file's overall completion. If you have received notification from your analyst that your file has been sent to Quality Assurance, please contact FCVS Customer Service before you change/add a recipient so that specific instructions may be given to you.

Quality Assurance (QA) is the final processing that is done for a file after all verification information is received, but before it is sent to the designated recipient. It is one of the most vital processes of the completion of your file, as it is at this point that the information received from all sources is structured and prepared for presentation in a concise, accurate, and objective fashion. The quality assurance process includes the following steps:

1. the scanning of the source verification documents into the system for secure storage and ease of use for Subsequent profiles,
2. the generation and printing of the Physician or Physician Assistant Profile,
3. comparison of the information provided in the application with that of the information provided by the sources, which may require follow up by the analyst,
4. the creation of the various summary reports which accompany the applicant's Profile, and
5. obtaining a Board Action Disciplinary Report.

After completion of the quality assurance process, the profile will ship to the designated recipient(s) via Airborne Express (which guarantee delivery by noon the business day after mailing) and verification will be sent to you via the U.S. Postal Service.

The average time of quality assurance processing can vary; dependent upon the complexity of the individual file; whether the file is an Initial Application or a Subsequent Request; the number of files currently in line for processing ahead of your own, and whether FCVS is currently in its peak activity season. When your file is sent to quality assurance, your analyst should provide you with notification of it's forwarding as well as the current estimated timeframe. You may additionally contact FCVS Customer Service to obtain the most current estimate.

FCVS does not generally offer to expedite a file for quicker processing, as this can only be done by moving an applicant's file ahead of other applicants' files (and thereby subordinates these applicants' files and needs to another's). Moreover, the highly detailed and important nature of the Quality Assurance process as a whole makes these steps highly non-conducive to being 'rushed' (Quality Assurance cannot be 'skipped' at all). At this point perhaps more than any, patience is paramount; you may rest assured that FCVS will complete the applicant's Profile and mail it as soon as possible.

To allow the quality assurance process the most expedient processing possible, the QA department does not take phone calls from any applicants regarding their file. Moreover, given that your analyst will no longer have your file at this point, they will also be unable to answer any questions on final processing. Please direct any questions about your file at this stage to FCVS Customer Service: 1-888-ASK-FCVS (within the U.S. only) or e-mail to fcvs@fsmb.org.

To check whether your Physician Profile has shipped or not, please check your profile status online at http://fcvs.fsmb.org. The status will indicate 'Mailed'. FCVS Airborne Express shipments leave our offices daily at 4:00PM Central Standard Time, and our databases are updated the following day.

After the applicant Profile has been completed and mailed, any overpayment of fees can be received as a refund. A letter will be sent to you via U.S. Postal Service when your file is shipped outlining how this may be done. You may also request a receipt for fees paid as well via written notification to FCVS. Given that there are cases of additional fees incurred while your file is being processed, FCVS does ask that applicants refrain from requesting a receipt until the Profile is completed and mailed; otherwise, additional receipts may be required to be provided as processing continues.

Once your Physician or Physician Assistant Profile has been completed and mailed, you may have it sent to an additional recipient via submission of an FCVS Subsequent Request Application (Physician | Physician Assistant). This application is available for download on this website. Once you have downloaded it, please print it, read the Application Instructions carefully, complete it fully (please note that much of the Subsequent Request provides the means to mark if certain information has not changed; the only portion which requires a full report of information is the section on postgraduate training), and mail it with the necessary fees to our offices using the lockbox address in the Instructions. Once the application is received, your file will be retrieved from our archives and processed for the designee that you have stated. This process averages approximately three to four weeks.