A recent poll of ifa readers found 75 per cent of respondents are looking to exit the industry rather than complete the necessary additional training required of them to meet FASEA’s proposed education standards.
Speaking to ifa about the data, AFA chief executive Phil Kewin said the results “highlight the level of angst and uncertainty that still exists in the adviser community” and the challenges that face the industry.
“We are all committed to raising the level of professionalism and while the bar can’t be set too low the standards need to be pragmatic, relevant and ensure a strong and growing advice profession,” he said.
“Obviously a large exodus from the industry would be a poor outcome for all, however we would like to think that this is an avoidable scenario.”
Mr Kewin said the advice industry will need to work together to ensure the final education standards are appropriate and that advisers required to undertake additional education are able to do so.
“We need to work co-operatively as a financial advice sector to ensure that we get a practical outcome on the education standards and we then assist our members to achieve the required standards by the deadline.”
Individiual advisers will need to consider their own circumstances before deciding on a course of action, Mr Kewin added.
“Advisers should consider their options, however we would strongly recommend that they all consider the best option to achieve the required education standard before they make any decision. There is far too much experience, knowledge and skill that needs to be retained in our profession,” he said.
“This is understandably an important and emotional issue, good advisers need to be retained and Australians deserve affordable quality personal financial advice.”
Was an adviser for 30 years, GONE!
I’m a risk only adviser with what I thought was about 8 years left until retirement. I have a degree that is deemed worthless by FASEA and I have DFP and ADFP both of which gave me no more knowledge than what I had already learnt by practicing. I’m not sure if the ADFP counts as any credit but even if it does I am still looking at $20,000 in training costs and 2-3 years of study and exams for what? Training and qualifications that will be useless in my day to day role and to my clients and for 3 extra years of practicing.
Most other advisers I know are in similar positions.
Can Phil Kewin reply to me with a convincing argument as to why I would even consider not just retiring early? I doubt I will get a reply.
If you are concerned the email of Kelly O’Dwyer is kelly.odwyer.mp@aph.gov.au . Don’t forget to tell her how many voting clients you can influence.
Every AFA or FPA staff member should have a double degree. A finance related & one more university degree should do it as well as a cfp qualification.
Anything less than this is unsatisfactory.
Please resign from your positions until this is your MINIMUM eduction standard. You know that you can’t do a good job unless this is completed so hop to it.
In a few years we expect you to have a masters just to be sure.
Can Phil Kewin and the other AFA board members please confirm if they currently meet the education standards and if not are they committing to undertake the necessary training and exams? I suspect the answer is no to both
Given their silence perhaps AFA and FPA board members who do not meet FASEA requirements “today” should automatically resign.
There are so many flaws and conflicts with FASEA it’s not funny. The University system is so broke and flawed also it’s not funny, and yet the FPA and AFA response is zero and time is ticking away. I wrote my business plan and I wrote it on the basis of leaving. To claim someone with a Masters in Financial Planning from 2006 or any finance related degree is not good enough is impractical. Will financial planners be required to do a Grad Dip in FP every ten years, if so why not under this current thinking?
I have been interested in doing further study. Particular some courses in the two subject matter areas that meet the Tax Practioners Board requirements so that I WOULD NOT NEED TO be dependent on being a member of the FPA. I also didn’t want to waste time and money doing courses below AQF7 knowing FASEA is around the corner. However I cannot find a Graduate Diploma in Financial Planning that meets both these two subject areas to meet TPB requirements. Kaplan for example told me I could enroll in their Australian Tax subject in the Grad Dip but I would need to enroll in another subject (at a discount) external to the Grad Dip in order to meet TPB requirements. I think this highlights just how wrong FASEA have got it in that the University system is not equipped to offer specialised training. It’s more broad concepts.
They are telling you porky pies mate. They just want your money. If you find a course of interest, that covers legal aspects of FP and another covering taxation, you can send the course description to the TPB and ask them to approve it. There is a good chance they have looked at it. If not they will literally take it to the board and approve it for you. I did this. No problem at all. It took me an hour or so to write up be request but worth the effort. No FPA membership for life now! I suspect huge numbers of advisers will follow in our footsteps and rid themselves of their ongoing CFP membership fees. The CFP designation will be worthless after 2024 and the only FPA members left will be the FSC!
one correction. the CFP designation is worthless [b]now![/b]
A while back I thought I would leave FPA and join AFA because It represented members more aggressively. Appears not. O’Dwyer is the most dangerous politician in the country.
ha ha i am one of those who left the FPA and Joined the AFA to realise they are one and the same, and an extension of the FSC
Me Too! No body meets the needs of the planning community at grass roots level. We need a proper body that does.
oh and i’ve left the AFA since, i refuse to pay membership fees for what
Over Complicated ODwyer is a complete disaster and the Advisers in the industry should be very strongly calling for her head to roll. She has butchered everything she has touched for Advisers.
Both the FPA and AFA might as well call themselves the FSC or at least sponsored by the FSC
many problems with the advice industry ie fraudulent customer documentation, pushing customers into products that pay the adviser high commission, moving customers to new insurance policies for more commission and so on – are due to ETHICAL issues of individuals, absolutely nothing to do with education, skills, or even experience. More qualifications will do nothing to change that. Either you are an honest person, or you aren’t.
Another weak message from a weak industry body. Brad Fox previously threw advisers under a bus with the LIF and corruptly accepting a deal for compulsory membership and sponsorship from the FSC.
There is no future in this industry and if you are over 50 plus (which a high proportion of advisers are), your time is better spent planning an early exit.
I know plenty of advisers with excellent degrees now not recognised because FASEA want to make money off them, nothing more. They do a great job but will not and should not be prepared to return to Uni just for a few extra years.
If you are younger you are better off studying for a career that will make you a living.
The AFA and FPA are sponsored puppets and if they can’t actually do anything would be better spending their time planning how they will survive with 75% less members and millions of customers left stranded.
I despair at the BS that is driving this country, and what our associations have allowed to happen to our industry. Tax payer funded fat cats building nothing, achieving nothing other than making their world easier and our world harder. (Also, suddenly, by having to join the TPB, I am now qualified to be give tax advice. What a heap of BS.
38 years in the industry + qualifications + ongoing study requirements = SWEET NOTHING !!
Fully support increasing educations standards but many of the decisions being made are political BS at best. What did they expect was going to happen? We’re going to have an industry where the greater majority are newer educated practitioners that lack any experience! Would you rather employ a tradesperson who just finished his/her training or someone who did the training many many years ago and now has 30+ years experience? And, I haven’t even touched on the ongoing education requirements we all need to do to main our competencies. Retirement in 3-4 years is looking good!
[b]Right on brother. [/b][b][/b]Couldn’t say it better myself!! Sickens me what FPA, AFA and LIFE COMPANIES have done to our industry! Where’s the SEPARATE SPECIFIC LICENCE FOR RISK ADVISERS? I’m looking at YOU life company execs who did NOT support advisers on this. You will be so sorry after 75% of your advisers have gone.
The average age of advisers has not helped. This shows that we are not encouraging young people to join our ranks and absorb the intellectual know-how of we more senior advisers. The exodus may even force the industry to go back to tied or multi-agents! nobody will have the resources to recruit and train advisers… a degree etc is academic and does not address enough of the soft skills required today. (my job seems more about counselling than anything else). A one year Experience year will not fill the gap either. I’m 27yrs in, former CFP and SMSF Specialist Advisor… I will be leaving unless this stupidity is stopped. Raise the bar – grandfather experience after the national exam…. those who fail should leave. Those that pass have proven abilities and paper qualifications are irrelevant to existing experienced advisers who have met ongoing CPD etc. Lift standard of CPD. FPA/AFA – you are part of the problem in allowing this to occur based on a flawed drive for “Professionalism” that places ethics on a piece of paper rather than behaviour. There are more lawyers and accountants in jail as a result of poor ethics than planners and they have degrees. Professionalism is not about product competence its about an attitude. Hard to instil when education per se is cookie cutter and lowest common denominator without “failure”. lift esteem in our populace and pride in our work and industry and professionalism will follow. Kick it until its almost dead and no amount of words will cause any professionalism whatsoever. Get our great industry back on track – sack O’Dwyer. Deconstruct FPA/AFA/FSC/FASEA and start again with two things in mind only – Client needs and Adviser needs. Not hard really. After all, we are all intelligent people who are capable of putting these needs first….. except certain groups who are putting themselves first viz a vie FPA/AFA/FSC/Industry funds/Pollies/training organisations.
Wow. Initially there was dead silence following the FASEA draft proposal and now these weak comments from one of our professional bodies. This is precisely why there will be a mass exodus.
professional bodies ? please! who are they ? the FPA who willingly ignored the AQF framework and peddled their courses without thinking about member best interest ? or the AFA who have remained silent
In the End, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends
-Martin Luther king Jr.
[b]POWERFUL[/b]AND SALIENT QUOTE THERE!!! A portent of the future of our once greata industry if ever there was one.
What a mess the industry has become – AFA, FPA, ASIC same same – one thing to “reform” an industry, another to “destroy” But hey, it was all about the..consumer… right?
Mr Kewin is a fool to think Advisers will stay in the industry poll results above indicate what will happen.
75% leaving is ridiculous… it wont happen.
And you know because …….
you wish
Yes it will and it could not be more obvious. Fact 1 the average adviser age is 55 plus ( why would they bother for say 2/3 extra years?) Fact 2 It will be very hard for new blood to enter the industry for many many years and who will be left to employ, mentor or train them?
it will happen if we all stay silent. and that’s what the AFA and FPA are doing.
You seem one of those fools who argue with FACTS and don’t believe your own eyes. Wakey wakes . . .
This industry is becoming a joke. ASIC have contibuted to all of this Kelly O’Dwyer where did they they get her from. Who else gets income clawed back for up to 2 years. Phil Kewin should know better – he would have seen this all coming when he was at Zurich. Why would any sensible person put up with this rubish. Thje big 4 banks must all be laughing at what is happening to this important industry.
No doubt standards need to be improved BUT those that have completed degrees and masters being told the qualification is redundant is garbage. Therein lies the reasoning for mass exodus by those presently highly qualified. Adviser associations have ONLY one mission in the near future and that is to extract informative details and lobby for real equitable outcomes for advisers. We pay membership fees so earn them and remember – no members- no jobs for you people either. Silence from the new body is deafening and negligent or maybe they are still getting their act together. Maybe move that date to 2026 to compensate.
YES . . . 2026 is an excellent idea. Would help the idiot academics save face and take stress away.
Move to 2026, not enough. I don’t mind the proposed exam, but I refuse to undertake substantial study on subjects I already know and have done previous study for, just to tick a box. Would prefer to invest in something anew. My time is too valuable for the rubbish that has been proposed.
lovely sentiments Phil – but the AFA rather than rolling on this should be making more comments to the effect that they HAVE a policy/plan and method for recognising existing advisers with relevant undergraduate quals along with ADFS etc. A points system has been touted but the AFA needs a leader willing to put their members first and go hard to FASEA with a clear and workable plan to support existing planners. Simply saying “oh come on fellas – another 3,4 or 5 Grad dip subjects wont be too hard and $2000 + per subject is good value!!” is not even close to OK
Brace yourselves for even more under-insurance problems. Nice one, ASIC – you muppets did it again.
Whats ASIC got to do with it?
They did help create the LIF with the corruptly flawed 413 which they refuse to release information on (red flag??) but no they are not involved in the education requirements. Kelly O’Dwyer is responsible on both counts and will be responsible for virtually wiping out an entire industry.
Yes, I agree. ASIC, AFA, FPA and the life companies can only, at best, be considered muppets extraordinaire, self interested and empty of any concern about ‘Client best interest’. Muppets all. The evidence confirms this as fact. Muppets.
if i am forced to study further i will study to become a lawyer. you people have rocks in your head if you think quality people will stay in this industry.
good luck with that
I had the same thought with a view of defending advisers but it seems my client base will shrink by 75%
there will be plenty of quality advisers…and a lot less average advisers