The AFCA are a flee-ridden cancerous tumor on the financial services industry. Is it pure coincidence or just "bad luck" for the financial services provider (FSP) that over 70% of all complaints are miraculously resolved in favour of the complainant!?! No doubt these statistics are there to justify AFCA's pathetic existence.

I have seen first hand the process AFCA goes through to increase and "puff up" a persons complaint, adding in more comments, reasons and basis for the complaint against the FSP just so they can have multiple ways to throw mud at them even though 80% of the complaint was never even thought of by the complainant, but AFCA will make sure more is added in so they can hang the FSP out to dry and charge them for each stage of the complaint and end up awarding the "poor and vulnerable" consumer a win then tell the government "Look at all these fantastic results we have been achieving!"

Question. don’t the banks also pay fees to ASIC? so aren’t the banks paying for their own law suits? and insurers to APRA and so on health funds, super funds. etc. these posts sounds like Advisers are paying for everything.

Amazing...just friggin amazing.

When it comes to scrutinizing this industry, regulators, politicians and the like will all happily focus on nothing but negative characteristics of this industry to make THEIR point yet now that we have an industry on its bloody knees - as a result of what big institutions and a minority of advisers did, they selectively point to the positives.

There was an abundance of positive stories about what advice and guidance advisers have provided their clients well before the Royal Commission came along - yet no one wanted to know.

Now that the industry has seen a drop of $30 Billion in revenue, advisers are leaving in droves - some tragically by suicide, insurance premiums are skyrocketing causing massive lapse rates never seen before and massive numbers of advisers dealing with unforseen levels of mental health concerns (me included), the regulators and people like this Greens Senator want to NOW start focusing on the 'alleged' positives.

You seriously couldn't make this crap up!

FASEA standard 1..."the adviser must act in accordance with all applicable laws, including the Code, and not try to avoid or circumvent their intent".....charging on a 12 month basis to avoid ongoing services is too high a risk... Good luck charging ongoing advice clients on a 12 month basis to avoid a FDS.....I once thought you wouldn't go to Jail for a spelling mistake in a SOA too, but that was when I was young and inexperienced and when ASIC was a regulator and not the current ASIC that is out to destroy advice. I'll be doing the FDS thanks.

There is a tragedy coming. There are great advisers who have left the industry and great advisers staying.
However the practices that are trying to do the right thing and service clients are already screaming out for advisers and there are none available. NONE AVAILABLE. This is going to cause more advisers to leave the industry as they burn out and can't keep up with their workload. Letting clients down hurts advisers who want to help people. What are government going to do about the future lack of advice.

Haha! Hilarious but will be the route they're contemplating.

Oh I am so relieved !!!!
ASIC really cares about advisers being able to provide advice easily after all.
They really want more people to be able to access advice, this measure will make everything easier.
NOT !!!

Systemic breaches, major breaches and/or breaches that are of detriment to the client should be reported. However ASIC don't follow up on these anyway, so I am not sure why they want all breaches including minor breaches that are corrected reported. Maybe they need to justify their fees ?

Well I'm not even sure the whole personal life insurance industry is going to remain viable under the current regime. Look at the money and inflows drying up in the last couple of years, the insane premium hikes and the restriction on IP policies. What they have managed to do is transfer this risk back onto every day Australians and the government.

The worst thing of all.... it was stated what would happen by many in the industry when these changes were proposed but people with their own agenda's that benefit no one but themselves managed to push their agenda's forward. But for some reason the focus was on trying to stop advisers being paid for their work.

Thank you AFA and Phil Anderson! Simple common sense really but sorry to say ASIC does not care and sees this as a money making fine opportunity so it means we are all F'd!

Wanker! Go out and get a real job!

What more proof does he need? The legislative response has resulted in a significant increase in costs, which has been passed onto clients. Less people are getting advice and those who are pay much more for it now. Financial planners, practices and licensees are walking out the door in droves. No one is able to provide quick and efficient scaled advice as BID makes it impossible to defend even the most frivolous complaint. ASIC is more interested in prosecuting than providing clear direction around the rules they enforce. The life insurance industry is on it's knees.
So in sum the legislators have made it worse for the clients, the advisers, the fund managers, the insurance companies and the licensees. The only winners the union funds, ambulance chasing lawyers and the regulators who can charge whatever they want to advisers. He must be so proud of his achievements.

Why in HELL would you back legislation and not know the outcome?? Is that how politicians fix problems now?

"Jury is still out..." NO IT IS NOT!! The destruction is happening before your blind eyes.

I am telling all my clients about this and the Liberal party destroying the financial planning industry and pushing up fees and pushing out advisers. I average 5 client meetings a week and most of these are couples so this is.............

approximately 400 VOTES...... then they tell their friends and then they tell their friends. All advisers need to do this are put the blame where it belongs, Liberal government and ASIC.

I will definitely not vote for LNP ever again after they have shafted our industry.We have taken a massive pay cut yet still expect us to pay an exhorbitant fee every year when it was the banks fault

Pushing for change without having any idea of whether that leaves us better off or not is just plain stupid and PWW should resign. Next they will close the coal power stations and then reflect whilst living in the dark if that was a good idea or not! Sheer incompetence once more from the Greens!

The Banking Royal Commission didn't really focus on banks. The size of their wallets made sure of that.

So no ASIC Levy next year? Yeah! Extrapolating from these numbers we should even look forward to a 'dividend' from ASIC next year instead of a Levy. Happy Days!

I hope some of these people in APRA either become homeless or have a family member become homeless due to the short sighted changes they are making for long term IP claimaints. Nothing like sticking the boot in when someone needs a hand up, just what you expect from government and their hangers on.

Instead of levying a general adviser fee each year on all advisers to cover ASIC's costs, wouldn't it make more sense for ASIC to cover their adviser and licensee oversight fees using these fines, or impose an added fee on those it successfully prosecutes? Or am I missing something?