The banning of Thanh Huu Tran follows a surveillance that found he was not adequately trained or is not competent to provide financial services, ASIC said in a statement.
ASIC said its surveillance focused on Mr Tran’s part in 2016 conduct by Futura Financial Group (a company of which Mr Tran was a director) that resulted in 331 Aon Master Trust (AMT) default superannuation members not switching to an AMT MySuper product.
The AMT MySuper product generally has lower fees and costs than AMT’s legacy default employer superannuation product, partly because MySuper products are prohibited from paying commissions to financial advisers.
Further, ASIC said its surveillance found that:
- Futura sent letters to 424 clients stating that if they did not respond to the letter within 30 days, their superannuation accrued default amount and future contributions would not go to a MySuper product;
- Following the issuing of the letter, Futura then sent an email and a text message to those clients for whom they had email and mobile phone contact details;
- Mr Tran then instructed a staff member to log in to the adviser portal of the AMT website to make investment choices on behalf of clients who did not respond to the letter, email or text message. Where Futura received an automated notification to indicate the message failed to deliver to the mobile or email, no changes were made to the relevant client’s account; and
- As a result, 331 clients’ default superannuation balances and future contributions were invested in the AMT’s legacy default superannuation product, instead of transitioning to MySuper, even though the clients had not given their instructions for this to happen.
ASIC noted that Mr Tran’s conduct effectively required the clients to ‘opt-in’ to MySuper, even though the government had designed the MySuper system as an opt-out scheme.
Mr Tran has the right to appeal to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal for a review of ASIC’s decision. The banning order for Mr Tran has been recorded on ASIC’s adviser register.
Small fish. Meanwhile, AMP and the big banks rip off their clients with impunity
[quote=Had enough]EXACTLY, SCUM iNDUSTRY fUNDS GET AWAY WITH BLUE MURDER, AND THE GOVT DOES NOTHING[/quote][quote=Had enough]
I seriously don’t get all this dog whistling over the Industry funds from advisers. You are all quick to jump on small things they do, but seem happy to turn a blind eye to the shit going on through the retail side of the industry. Yes, insurance through Industry funds is rubbish, but that is an easy workaround.
Grateful if all those such as Had Enough and Anons that are so adamant that Industry funds are criminals and getting away with Blue Murder category would enlighten me why they believe this.
what it also fails to say that at an initial look at 25 clients at random not one was worse off
The clients who did not respond he should removed himself as the advisor as per per opt in rules.t goes to show how some clients just aren’t concerned with their Fin planning. scary time a head. I think this just the beginning. A reminder to go through you client base and have service agreement with all of them the ones who dont reply, remove from your client list. Yes you will loss income, but if you are not servicing them then you arenot entitled to the income ( Fee for no service)
EXACTLY, SCUM iNDUSTRY fUNDS GET AWAY WITH BLUE MURDER, AND THE GOVT DOES NOTHING
Wonder how many industry super schemes did exactly this on a larger scale?
Precisely zero. Their default options already met MySuper requirements.