Auto mechanic and automotive technician licence in Puerto Rico: the two categories and the exam

The licence is not optional

Let us start with what surprises people coming from outside, or those who have spent years working in a family shop: in Puerto Rico no one may practise or offer to practise as an automotive technician or mechanic without first holding a licence from the Board. That is Act No. 40 of 25 May 1972, as amended.

The same law adds two things you will see in any serious shop on the island. The licence must be displayed somewhere visible at the workplace. And the Board also issues you an ID card with your photo and licence number, which you must carry when working away from the shop.

Any shop with a name to protect will ask for it. It is the number one reason a good mechanic stays earning less than they are worth.

Mechanic and technician are two different licences

The Automotive Technicians and Mechanics Examining Board, known as JETMA, issues two licences, and the difference between them decides who supervises whom.

The auto mechanic does maintenance, repair and adjustment, but works under the supervision, responsibility and certification of an automotive technician. The automotive technician is the one who diagnoses, who answers for the work, and who is authorised to instruct, coordinate, supervise and certify both the mechanic and the apprentice.

The current regulation covers vehicles driven by any kind of motor: internal combustion, external, electric, hybrid or any other propulsion system. Electric and hybrid vehicles are not outside the rules, they are inside them.

There is a third thing almost nobody knows: anyone teaching automotive mechanics at a public or private school on the island must hold an automotive technician licence and be a member of the association, on top of the Department of Education certificate.

Mechanic: from 16, ninth grade and 600 hours

This is the fastest way into the trade and the one fewest people know about. The auto mechanic licence needs four things: being sixteen, holding a ninth-grade diploma or its equivalent, having passed a general automotive mechanics course of at least six months or six hundred hours at a vocational school or a school recognised by the General Education Council, and passing the Board's exam.

Sixteen and ninth grade. For a kid who is not enjoying school but spends every weekend under a car, that is a real road into a licensed trade.

The mechanic licence lasts five years.

Technician: 18, high school and 1,200 hours

The automotive technician licence requires being eighteen, holding a fourth-year high school diploma, and longer training: a course of at least two years in motor vehicle mechanics or electromechanics, or a twelve-hundred-hour course, at a vocational school or an institution accredited by the Department of Education or the Council on Higher Education.

Anyone who completed the training course prescribed by the Puerto Rico Apprenticeship Council also qualifies. If that is how you trained, upload the evidence of that training instead of the vocational school diploma.

The law also requires good conduct, evidenced by a recent criminal record certificate from the Puerto Rico Police.

The technician licence also lasts five years.

The board exam: when, where and how much

The Board must offer the exam at least twice a year, but since 2018 the calls are continuous: you can apply for the exam at any point after the call's opening date. You do not have to wait for a date in the newspaper.

You apply for the exam at revalidasonline.com. There you fill in the application, pay, pick a date and time from the options offered, and walk away with a confirmed appointment in minutes. The exam costs one hundred dollars plus applicable tax, paid by card or by money order to Test Innovations.

The exam is computer-based and offered in Spanish and in English on request. It is multiple choice, in four question formats, including the classic technician A versus technician B items.

The passing score is seventy per cent. The technician category has two parts and you need seventy on each. If you fail one part and pass the other, you only retake the one you failed.

The year that starts running when you pass

This is the part that costs people money and appears in no advertisement.

Passing the exam is not the same as holding the licence. A passed exam is good for one year for the purpose of applying for the licence. Let that year go by without completing the process and you sit the exam again, and pay again. The same applies part by part in the technician category: each passed part expires after a year.

So the day you walk out of the exam with a passing score, the clock starts that same month. Gather your paperwork before, not after.

The licence application: paperwork and fees

Once you pass, the licence is applied for at pr.pcshq.com, the Professional Credential Services portal. PCS answers at prmecanicos@pcshq.com and 1-888-773-9266.

What you upload, all as PDFs and no phone photos: high school diploma or transcript (or ninth grade, depending on the category), the certification and transcript from the institution where you took the course, evidence of passing both parts of the exam, the negative criminal record certificate from the Police, the negative ASUME debt certificate required by Article 30 of Act 86 of 1994, and the sworn statement for initial licences. Separately, a 2x2 passport-style digital photo in JPG, JPEG, PNG or GIF.

Licence fees are sixty dollars for automotive technician and forty for auto mechanic.

Watch two expiry dates: the criminal record certificate is good for thirty days and the ASUME one for ninety. Pull those last.

If you have a criminal record, the door is not closed: you submit a letter from your socio-penal officer along with the application.

Without association membership they do not hand over the licence

This is where a lot of people who did everything else get stuck. Technician and mechanic licences are only handed over once you submit certification that you have joined the Automotive Technicians and Mechanics Association, as required by Act No. 78 of 23 September 1992, as amended.

It is not a side errand you can leave for later. Plan for that step and that cost from the start, the same way you plan for the exam.

Renewing: five years, and the price of forgetting

Licences last five years and must be renewed thirty days before they expire.

Miss the date but renew within the year following expiry and you pay double the fees. Let more than a year pass and the Board denies the renewal after notice and hearing, and to hold the licence again you must meet every requirement as a first-time applicant, exam included.

The Board also checks continuing education at renewal, so keep the certificates from any training you take.