absolutely! did you learn something? is it relevant to actuarial work?
does not have to fit within the confines of the traditional exam syllabus or be directly applicable to what your actuarial team does.
there are limits for general business or whatever.
Actually, the American Academy standard is weaker than âdid you learn somethingâ. If you enter into the experience with a sincere intention of learning something, you can take credit for it even if the actual seminar, or paper, or whatever, failed to live up to your expectations. That surprised me when I was told that, so itâs stuck.
(I still often only take partial credit for a seminar that mostly covers ground I already know.)
This is my last year where most of my CE is made up of study time. Next year is a scary thought.
Continuing down the tangent⌠what about a session that doesnât last as long as advertised?
You pay to go to an SOA or CAS meeting, seeing that thereâs a 50 minute Professionalism session.
But then it actually only lasts 40 minutes and they let you go 10 minutes early. Do you log 40 minutes or 50?
I would think 40 (similarly if the Q&A runs 5 minutes over and I stayed for it, Iâd count 55). But Iâve had actuaries swear up and down that you paid for 50 minutes, you get to log 50 minutes.
Thoughts?
Oh, the other weird thing about CE. Letâs say you fail an exam with a 0. Youâre not supposed to count time that you spent âstudyingâ.
But what counts as âstudyingâ? Surely if I just randomly picked up the Group Insurance textbook and read three chapters when I wasnât sitting for an exam, Iâm allowed to count the time I was reading the book. But if I take an exam where itâs tested and get a 0 then that negates the time I was reading the textbook?
That seems ridiculous to me. So I assume that âstudyingâ means things like working practice problems or taking practice tests.
When I was sitting for exams I never logged time as âstudyingâ. I logged âread chapters 22-24 of Group Insuranceâ or whatever. That way just in case I ever got a 0, I could still count it. Also, you never knew your score on the fall exams until after 12/31, at which point you had to certify compliance. So I just avoided the issue altogether.
I donât know if thatâs the right interpretation, but itâs what I did. 
Thatâs a good thing, because generally I mainly remember something more than learn something.
I log as many minutes as I attended. If I show up late, or they end early, I donât count those minutes. Unless I didnât keep track of the exact time, in which case I go by the schedule. But if itâs substantially different from whatâs scheduled, in either direction, I generally DO keep track. And ten minutes is a substantial fraction of 50.
Of course, I almost never pay for CE. My employer generally picks up the tab. I try not to abuse that, of course, but itâs not like Iâm feeling cheated out of dollars if something doesnât run exactly to schedule.
fwiw, Iâve been to CE that ran over by 10 minutes. Usually, if they are in danger of ending early, they try hard to get a few more questions from the audience. I think itâs uncommon for CE to end significantly early, at least, the CE that Iâve been to. It does sometimes start late if the preceding thing ran late. (But then the same fee probably covered both.)
Eh, itâs only about 15% or so.
Thatâs my general take too, although I try to be just as conscientious with my employerâs money as my own.
If my employer paid for 50 minutes of CE and through no fault of theirs or mine the session lasted 20% less time than advertised I would indeed feel a little cheated.
But I still wouldnât log the time.
40 minutes, but report the presenters, host, and/or sponsor to the ABCD (Precept 11).
Alternate thoughts:
(Italic part added)
My real answer is the same as yours & Lucyâs, but Iâve never been remotely short of CE, so 0.2 hour isnât significant to me.
If it is in the ballpark of what was scheduled, I just put what was scheduled. 42 minutes instead of 50? I put 50. 58 minutes instead of 50? I put 50. They likely even out.
I also am never at the border of CE, so it wouldnât matter if they came back and said I had 5 minutes less for one activity.
Jeesh, are there any normal people here?
No, if I attend a 1 hour session, and the session ends early, you bet your ass Iâm logging it as 1 hour.
This is why Trump won yaâll, be relatable.
I had one employer who was crazy stingy about paying for ASAs to attend meetings, so once I stopped taking exams it became an issue.
It was SUCH a breath of fresh air to go to an employer that had a totally different attitude towards CE.
The CAS has tons of very affordable webinars, which my employer routinely pays for. Many consultants offer free webinars that are relevant to my job. Ever since webinars have been a thing, Iâve never had anything remotely like a financial issue with obtaining enough CE. There are years when I havenât gotten around to taking enough organized CE until near the end of the year. But itâs a time thing, not a money thing.
I often log it at the end of the year, so I put in what was scheduled because I donât keep track of the second it let out. Iâm in no way surprised there are actuaries who do.
Thatâs fair. I donât usually think that hard about how many minutes of CE I expect to get out of a thing, so I just jot down what I did get. If the thing was just bad, I usually count it, but if a chunk of it predictably covered stuff I didnât need a refresher on, I donât. So my algorithm comes to much the same as yours. I just rate retroactively. 
Oh, I log ASAP. If I didnât, I would have no CE. I canât remember what I did in February come November. I usually log anything I plan to count by the end of the day.
Well most of my CEs come from CAS meetings. So I just go to the website (or wherever the agenda is stored) and remind myself what I attended