ifa understands that the Financial Services Minister has not suggested “qualified advisers” should be known as “product advisers”, as was previously reported by The Australian Financial Review.
Although the minister has sought input from the industry on alternative names, ifa understands a substitute title has yet to be determined.
Speaking to ifa on the matter of the “qualified adviser” blunder, senior manager of government relations and policy at the Financial Advice Association Australia (FAAA), George John said: “We haven’t had anything confirmed by Mr Jones’ office, but he did reiterate at the FAAA roadshow last week that he would change the name of the term ‘qualified adviser’.”
“We have been asked for our views. We’ve provided some views, obviously, I don’t think that we’re expecting any published changes to what that term will be until we see that tranche two exposure draft which we’re still expecting mid-year,” John said.
He assured that the FAAA is applying “every bit of pressure” on the government to spur on the release of the tranche two draft legislation.
“We do know that tranche two is going to be the substantial package of reform for financial advice, and we are encouraging everyone across government to move ahead with that legislation as soon as possible.”
Earlier this week, responding to a separate inquiry into the Quality of Advice Review (QAR) delays, the minister told ifa: “The government is focused on improving the quality and affordability of financial advice by cutting red tape on financial advisers that offers no protections for consumers.
“Legislation is being developed through 2024 to reform statements of advice and remove the safe harbour steps which will significantly drive down costs for financial advisers.”
Additionally, Jones joined the Financial Service Council’s (FSC) post-budget webcast where he shared that he wants to “get this done” before May next year and that he wants to focus his “love and attention” on doing that.
At the time, Treasury was said to be hosting roundtables to debate the specificities of various parts of the government’s response to the QAR, including the idea of “qualified advisers”.
While Minister Jones earlier floated the possibility of a diploma as the minimum requirement for the new class of advisers, in March it was suggested that this diploma could be one issued by the institution employing the “qualified adviser”.
what about ‘back packing desk jockey’?
Certified Product Adviser or CPA for short lol
Certified Qualified Adviser
I’m 110% confident based on the non stop flow of bad legislation, the current anti adviser, adversarial approach, and a focussed desire to reduce Advisers numbers to around 5,000 that this term will not be changed.
If they’re called product adviser they better be funding the ASIC levy cslor and FSCP
Yeah Nah nice try
This was the only sensible thing reported from Jones ever, and it wasn’t correct. Good grief why on earth are financial advisers in Australia that don’t work for one product only, get treated like rubbish and undermined by such an incompetent government. Embarrassing
The question was asked some time ago now as to exactly who was responsible for penning the term ” Qualified Adviser” in relation to this matter.
The over paid and under worked public servant who lives in the pretend bubble world of Canberra needs to step forward and be ” named and shamed” as they demand Advisers are if they have made a monumental mistake or error in judgement.
But NO:
No response, no names & no responsibility.
Jones is utterly clueless.
More rubbish. I hate coming on these websites. Never any good news for professional advisers ever.
Every day, more crap out of Canberra.
Jones out, Labor out.
Product Agent! Not adviser
Pretty much, back to product flogging to the consumer for cheap fees.
I’ve seen industry super funds advertising “qualified financial advisers” on social media already. What a sh… show!
“Product Advisers” would make sense. Otherwise, what do people call the current Qualified Financial Advisers?
I’ve previously referred to myself as a ‘qualified financial adviser’ on my website and alike. I’ve since removed any reference to qualified for fear of confusion.
Why on earth is the word “adviser” even being considered for this role? They should be referred to as “client service consultants” because that’s what they are. To refer to them as “advisers” in any form only serves to undermine the credibility of the profession that we have strived so hard to achieve.
Wayne, I hate to say it but we lost our opportunity to be regarded as a profession when the government moved the goal posts and removed the need for each adviser to meet the education requirement. I went back and completed a grad diploma which was akin to dragging myself over broken glass. At the time I genuinely thought we were on the cusp of self regulation which was heralding the end to the absurd AFSL regime.