CPD stands for Continuing Professional Development. CPD hours are time spent learning new information or gaining new skills.
Members of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) need to complete at least 20 CPD hours every year. If they don’t, they will need to pay a penalty and can even have their membership withdrawn. You can’t just do any old learning. RICS CPD hours are CPD hours that are approved by RICS. For example, spending 30 hours reading about football strategy would not count as CPD hours in your tally to prove your fulfilment of the membership criteria. This is because knowledge of football doesn’t improve you as a surveying professional. The point of gaining these hours is for each member to improve and therefore contribute their value to the organisation.
RICS divides its CPD hours into ‘Formal’ and ‘Informal’. Each member must complete a minimum of 10 Formal RICS approved CPD hours per year, the rest of the 20 can be Informal.