Part 3 is usually the lightest of the three Enrolled Agent exam parts, and most candidates spend 40 to 50 hours on it. It's 100 multiple-choice questions in 3.5 hours, and you need a scaled 500 on the 200 to 800 scale. The people who get caught out are the ones who treat it as common sense. It rewards knowing the rules for dealing with the IRS, and Circular 230 plus collections and appeals drive a large share of the questions.
Part 3 of the Special Enrollment Examination (SEE) covers Representation, Practices and Procedures. Part 1 covers individuals and Part 2 covers businesses. Part 3 is about what an enrolled agent is authorized to do and how the tax administration process runs: Circular 230 ethics, powers of attorney, the examination and audit process, appeals, collections, penalties, and the mechanics of filing.
Format, scoring and dates
You take it at a PSI Services test center or through PSI remote proctoring, in a 3.5-hour appointment. Of the 100 questions, 85 are scored and 15 are experimental items being tested for future exams. You can't tell which is which, so answer all of them as if they count, and if a question seems strange, don't let it rattle your pacing. It may just be an unscored item. PSI doesn't publish the raw-to-scaled conversion, but a passing score has historically corresponded to roughly 70% of the scored questions. You find out pass or fail on screen when you finish.
The SEE testing year historically ran from May 1 through the end of February. The 2026-27 window runs July 1, 2026 through February 28, 2027 (PSI Services took over administration from Prometric in March 2026), with a spring blackout while the content is updated. Part 3 is tested on the tax law in effect during the window, and because the SEE now updates each July (it refreshed each May under Prometric), last year's material can cost you points on a current-year rule. Make sure yours matches the window you're testing in.
The four domains
The IRS content outline for Part 3 has four domains. Exact question counts shift a little between windows, but the structure and rough emphasis are stable.
| Domain | What's in it |
|---|---|
| Practices and Procedures | Circular 230, the rules governing practice before the IRS, preparer penalties, due diligence, e-file requirements and the sanctions process. The largest domain, 26 of the 85 scored questions (about 31%). |
| Representation before the IRS | Powers of attorney (Form 2848), third-party authorizations, who can represent whom, the audit and examination process, and the appeals process. Another large block. |
| Specific Areas of Representation | Collections, liens, levies, installment agreements, offers in compromise, penalties and abatement, innocent spouse relief, and trust fund recovery. Substantial and detail-heavy. |
| Filing Process | Record maintenance, electronic filing rules, and accuracy of information provided to the IRS. The smallest domain. |
The first two domains, ethics and representation, together make up about 60% of the scored questions, so start there. Circular 230 is dense and dry, and it's also the most heavily tested single source. If you can't state the practitioner standards and the sanction process from memory, you're not ready yet.
A four to five week plan
Part 3 has less computation than the other two parts, so most of your time goes to reading, understanding the process and drilling questions rather than working numbers. At about 10 hours a week, I'd plan it this way:
- Week 1: Circular 230 and preparer rules. It's the backbone, so learn it cold: who may practice, the standards of conduct, the sanctions and due diligence obligations. Finish the week with a full question set.
- Week 2: representation and authorizations. Forms 2848 and 8821, scope of representation, the examination process and the audit lifecycle, with practice questions daily.
- Week 3: appeals and collections. The appeals process, collection due process, liens versus levies, installment agreements and offers in compromise. This is where detail matters most.
- Week 4: penalties, specific relief and filing. The trust fund recovery penalty, innocent spouse, penalty abatement and the filing-process domain, then mixed-topic review.
- Week 5 (buffer): two or three full-length timed sittings, reviewing every miss.
If you're testing Parts 1, 2 and 3 back to back, take Part 3 last. The procedural overlap with the earlier parts means some of the material will already be in your head.
The most useful thing you can do for Part 3 is answer questions and then read the explanation for every one you get wrong and every one you got right by guessing. The exam phrases things in a way that rewards recognition more than recall from a blank page. My routine would be:
- Learn a topic, then drill 20 to 30 questions on it right away. Don't read for a week and then start questions.
- Log the reason for every miss. A rule you didn't know, a detail you confused and a careless read each need a different fix: confused details need a comparison chart, and careless reads need slower pacing.
- Build comparison tables for the things that look alike: liens versus levies, an offer in compromise versus an installment agreement, Form 2848 versus 8821. The wrong answers on collections are built from mixing these up, so learn the definitions and the order of the collection process.
- Do full-length timed sets in the final week. You get about two minutes per question. Most people finish with time to spare, but you want to confirm that under a clock.
Part 3's reputation as the easy part leads people to under-prepare, and in the 2024-25 window it passed at about the same rate as Part 2. For practice, the EA Part 3 question bank on FreeFellow has 899 original practice questions with step-by-step solutions and 18 written lessons, free with an account. Mixed sets are free, and drilling one domain at a time is part of Fellow. FreeFellow is independent and not connected to the IRS, so use it alongside current source material, not in place of it.