Mr De Gori took to Twitter on Friday to answer public questions related to FASEA and the incoming adviser education standards.
The questions addressed numerous issues, particularly around the proposed ‘10-year rule’ that will require advisers with relevant degrees to enrol in a new course if their previous degree is a decade or more old.
The CEO and former head of government relations at the FPA laid out the association’s position, but stopped short of commenting on Dr Adrian Raftery’s prediction, published in ifa, that FASEA might seek to scrap the ’10-year rule’.
This is about having a degree qualification as the new entry framework for financial planning. The FPA supports this. The question is how do you transition existing planners into this new framework & we support recognition of CPD & all studies completed to help. #AskDante https://t.co/OZYKNs78Yv
— Dante De Gori CFP (@ddegori10) February 9, 2018
I wont speculate on this – but as I have been trying to communicate this is a proposal and we have a consultation process to deal with areas of the proposal that are unfair and/or not within the spirit of the objective of these reforms. #AskDante https://t.co/PDP7zGrh31
— Dante De Gori CFP (@ddegori10) February 9, 2018
The FPA-run CFP program was another topic of interest for those asking questions, with some questioning the value of maintaining the designation.
I am questioning whether the #CFP is worthwhile given it isn’t on FPEC’s list. I will not be enrolling in my last subject as a result and will seek out an alternate FPEC Master’s degree where hopefully, the 4 completed are given expemtions #AskDante #FPAFAIL https://t.co/9TuDMjn9aq
— AD (@ozajd) February 9, 2018
#askdante Why doesn’t the CFP qualification count towards FPEC’s
tertiary qualifications? Is it a lower standing than a master and/or degree?— AD (@ozajd) February 9, 2018
Dr Adrian Raftery himself was an active participant in the Twitter exchange, posing a number of questions to the FPA CEO.
What percentage of advisers do you expect to leave the industry by 1/1/2024? #AskDante
— Dr Adrian Raftery (@MisterTaxman) February 9, 2018
What percentage of advisers do you think will fail their university studies? @ddegori10 #AskDante
— Dr Adrian Raftery (@MisterTaxman) February 9, 2018
Do you think the suite of 101 subjects (Tax 101, Super 101, Finance 101, Investments 101, FP 101, Ethics 101, etc) are the most appropriate for experienced advisers that need to study? @ddegori10 #AskDante
— Dr Adrian Raftery (@MisterTaxman) February 9, 2018
Adviser and FPA member Jason McFadden challenged Mr De Gori over the FPAs commitment to its members.
#dante @ddegori10 Get over it. Clearly you don’t take this issue serious. #FASEA will have a major impact on Financial Planning and you are not taking mbrs concerns. https://t.co/Jb4kgnv9eh
— Jason McFadden (@JPMAdvice) February 9, 2018
Why would you be so stupid as to submit FPEC list to FASEA #askdante https://t.co/QuKOLRaE08
— Jason McFadden (@JPMAdvice) February 9, 2018
In response to this, Mr De Gori told Mr McFadden there was “no need for that language” and asked that he and other individuals asking questions remain respectful and constructive in their comments.
Mr De Gori continued to answer these questions for a full hour, with some members praising him for responding to their questions.
#ThanksDante you can now sit back and relax #AskDante @ddegori10 @AustraliaFPA pic.twitter.com/Yz3YbuYibM
— Cara Williams (@_cara_williams) February 9, 2018
The twitter exchange follows a number of concerns raised by FPA members to ifa about the FPA’s relationship with FASEA and role in the mandatory education regime.
I’m currently completing a Master of Applied Finance with an investment focus as I thought that alongside ADFP and perhaps CFP it would be sufficient and would benefit clients if I had better than ‘Investment 101’ knowledge – i.e. stuff they can do themselves by reading a book. I now find out its not likely to be relevant. I’m not sure how much more existing advisers can learn from a Masters – I know several who are breezing through one particular course because its repeat of ADFP etc, plus years of experience. Perhaps my newfound knowledge would be put to better use elsewhere, and with less risk.
As the pendulum swings, you expect some balance of the swing, but for far too long there has been regulator influence from incompetent people with no real industry knowledge. I’m far from 65 but done my 30 years and i see no value in staying as our experience has no value. Its sad, but a lot of valued advisers will depart. That leaves a lot to do for those left? Not really, as advice and compliance requires beyond human ability inputs and good advice is not compliant advice necessarily and bad advice can be compliant. Im out. To complete advice and and its associated work now takes an incredible amount of time which is not seen as value to the client and many times it isnt.
Someone asked why is the FPA’s CEO is so silent? For all you guys going back to school: Try this. He is too busy:
A) counting his FPEC dollars.
B) He and Dante are currently out for lunch with CBA trying to renew their lump sum payments and various other puppet master fees. You see he’s worried about the loss of income in the CFP program.
C) Writing a white paper about the impact on deregulation of the Zambia dollars on financial participants.
D) talking to Deakin and Griffith Uni about white labelling a Grad Dip
My doctor did his degree about 20 years ago. I did my accounting degree 21 years ago. I know architects who qualified 30 years ago etc. Lets go to everyone and say your degree is only good for 10 years and you have to spend 6 doing it again (remember a part time degree takes 6 years). This is a joke and is way beyond community expectations.
And way beyond the requirements of the legislation. FASEA has massively exceeded their mandate. O’Dwyer needs to clean out the FASEA board and start again with people who are conflict free and understand their job.
Hey let’s ensure ALL Politicians need to up skill and ALL go and get a degree in Common Sense and Ethics.
And O’Dwyer, your past law degree will count for nothing !!!! It’s over 10 years old.
Why are we planners angry. NO clear direction!
Our lives are on hold pending correct information to plan ahead. Business decisions are on hold- buy- sell-expand. Extra staff ?. It is all about our business and future and family and INCOME. So guess what Dante- we have every damn right to be angry. I am going to rude also- twitter is garbage as a medium- questions were answered like a pollie- so have a open live forum and take the shots like a real man and a leader. remember- its your future as well.
He has already positioned himself for future leadership position in government or in some form of lobbying at your expense. a lot of these ceo type jobs are platforms for these people to move on to next, often higher pay
yes, i know it is at your’s and my expense unfortunately.
i call on all fair minded advisers who are currently afa and FPA members respectively to resign immediately
only a mass rejection will provide any incentive for them to act
You have hit the nail on the head. Those who purport to represent us are doing nothing more than using us as a stepping stone to their next Government or corporate leadership position. They couldn’t give a stuff about us. We have no representation.
agree. and why not we are stupid. we keep paying for the circus and merry go around.
fair minded advisers, i call on one and all, and have done so myself, please hand back your afa and fpa membership today
1,000 is the number i am calling for.
please for the love of god send to dante today via express post
yes, we must unanimously and unequivocally reject these tripe associations
Has anyone heard a peep from FPA president Neil Kendall on this issue?
nope he is busy sending out his CV looking for alternative employment
Sadly, advisers can’t expect the FPA to act in members best interest here. They are not the professional association we want them to be. They are so conflicted by several separate revenue generating areas, that they do not know what’s in the best interest of Australians and planners. If planners want the best outcome for our clients, as said by another here, we need to write to our MP’s and list our education, length of running businesses and clearly point out the absurdity of FASEA. We are in it alone.
To the FPA: We know you are not FASEA, but FPA members have every right to be angry. As someone who went out and did a now worthless degree to help lift standards, I am just so bitterly disappointed by the FPA’s own submission. I will very likely just hand back my CFP (it’s worthless) downgrade my membership, or leave entirely. I sense the FPA will be too busy making money offering white labeled courses from your FPEC mates at either Deakin or Griffith Uni that you won’t care.
FPA , AFA and the Deckin boys club are playing advisers like fools whilst being funding by the Big 4 to run a royal commission that will show it was the Adviser not the fund manager or insurer who was at fault. As for Mr Rafty, why are you not promoting that if you sell insurance that you do not do one year study of medician as that is the area of risk that an adviser needs to understand, oh that’s right, you dont teach that do you sir, about time you went back to your website MR Taxman
I think studying some medicine units would definitely be relevant for risk advisers. You will find that most degrees have electives that you could pick & choose a few units. Problem is that the way the FASEA proposal is currently structured that there may not be much love if you went down the medicine route. However I think its a great idea & I hope you don’t mind be using it in my submission/s.
Interesting that Dante chose to have this “discussion” on Twitter. A platform with minimal usage by older planners who are most affected by the FASEA changes.
what would you prefer? Telegrams?
Many would prefer an open forum meeting. But Dante wouldn’t. Should have seen him shut down the questions and scurry off stage in last years FPA meeting when the glorious “100 point plan” was announced.
But why not a recorded webinar? That has been the standard format for most FPA regulatory updates. It would still give Dante the distance from the audience and control over questions he craves, yet would be far more amenable technology for most members. No silly character limits either.
he doesn’t want to be accountable for the fiasco and limiting comments to 140 characters limits the venom that can be spewed by the totally screwed and totally miffed advisers
dante very cunning you take him for a fool ? he very cunning
no i was thinking snail mail. you know we right to each other in wonderful caligraphy
Linkedin was also used for the discussion…
Apparently the next session is going to be done like those guys waving flags on ships. I can see him waving flags on HMAS FPA Titanic saying, “all done, everyone is happy”.
The FPA is just going to go out and set up another separate entity and will be offering white labeled education solutions for a nice fee. They are laughing behind our backs all the way to the bank as a result of this legislation. Why else are they silent? Why would they promote CPD as being worth 14 points out of 100. YES 14 points, in their 100 point plan. Why would they submit their select chosen FPEC list, based on Universities that paid to be on it and ignore broad degrees?
On behalf of Deakin University – and I could probably talk on behalf of other universities as well – I refute the claim that we have ever paid any money to be on the FPEC Approved Degree list. It may surprise you but not everything on ‘Approved’ lists in this industry/profession is the result of a transfer of funds.
While all you Financial Planners are walking around with knives deeply thrust into your backs by the FPA you are all getting done over again with this nonsense of education. The FPA is not needed and you let these thieves ruin your industry.
I pity the poor planners who need to continue in this circus run by a greedy mafia type organisation.
well said, i cannot believe that members of the FPA and AFA haven’t resigned in droves yet. what are you waiting for ? are you waiting for some action on your behalf by either to redeem you ? NO! they will put that big knife -metaphorically speaking- into you further and then twist it for additional pleasure
hand back your membership certificates and cfp certificates by mailing it to :
Dante DeGored, CFP
true dat. these types of associations respond [b]only when[/b][u][/u] their own salaries are stake. if 1,000 or members resign en masse you will get an ad in the afr extolling the virtues of the FPA and being a member
let’s try this as an experiment to see if it happens
The FPAi is clearly out of its depth. How can we have proper consultation when FASEA has hijacked the process with a draft that isn’t even remotely appropriate? It is an obvious tactic to divert attention away from other important issues and eventually look conciliatory when they back down slightly with a final draft which remains excessive and unfair.
100% correct. All well educated and well experienced advisers need to be strongly in their MPs faces to tackle ODywer as the controller of FASEA.
ODwyer is like cancer to advisers
It is sad that some people in Australia believe additional Education will solve the problem of a few Unscrupulous advisers within the Financial Services industry being weeded out. It is not education that will get rid of the rogues. It is Dealer groups not taking on advisers that have got a poor history, can be solved by some diligent reference checking. The large organizations also should allow their advisers to invest in fund managers outside of the major institutions.
Rod, This idea has no chance of getting over the line. It makes sense and it is logical. But I like your thinking.
Can anyone explain this 10 year rule ? My understanding was that you complete a degree, find a job in a related field and then apply what you have learned and enrich your knowledge via practical experience. You then compliment this by joining a professional association and complete professional PD points each year to ensure you keep up with legislation and best practise. What then is the relevance of the 10 year rule ? Possibly if you were working in a completely different field and wanted to re enter the profession it might have some relevance but for those of us who have continued in the profession ?
10 year rule = transfer of money from financial adviser pockets to universities. There is no other purpose for it.
Raftery also tweeted that planners who have completed the CFP education program could get exemption for 4 units of a Grad Dip. Since when? Is this a canny new marketing ploy by Deakin to exploit the FASEA debacle?
While 4 exemptions is better than 1, the CFP course is 5 units. Deakin will need to up their offer to 5 if they want to be competitive. I suspect other institutions will.
Regardless of exemptions offered, there is still no way anyone with a degree who has completed the CFP program should be forced to go back to uni. FASEA has massively exceeded their mandate in that regard, and consequently invited serious questions about conflicts of interest.
i am not sure, but perhaps it is the Ethics unit that does not receive credit under the new framework? A little ironic given we are all so unethical and standardize education is supposed to solve all.
They’ve upgraded it, it was only late December that they were advertising that out of the 5 CFP units, it would give you just one exemption towards their own subjects. The Question is WHY? Wasn’t good enough for Deakin before FASEA and now it is. They know FASEA is huge windfall gain for them. Now ask what would be the outcome if your submission focused on a FPEC list. Just Stupid.
Adrian Raftery here. Been no change to our policy. We increased credits from 3 to 4 in 2011 (when I started at Deakin) – 4 in fact is the maximum number of credits that we can give for our 8 unit Grad Diploma. I think you will find that this is pretty competitive compared to other institutions. Potentially we can give up to 10 credits for 16 unit Masters degree. If you have any issues with credits for prior learning then drop me a line anytime.
Which Grad Dip units are exempted for CFP program graduates? And do any of the remaining units qualify for standalone TPB recognition without having to maintain FPA membership?
4 units of study at post graduate level is still difficult when running a business full time. speaking from experience, post grad level subjects require a lot of additional research and independent study on top of already full schedule running a very busy practice, staff, clients etc to see, it is an enormous undertaking and for most who are in a similar position, it will probably be difficult to try and do more 1 x unit per year.
How much has to happen before advisers realise that our industry bodies the FPA and AFA are not working for members or customers but for the instos that will pay the most. Government don’t take seriously so why should members?