Financial Planning Association (FPA) chief executive Mark Rantall is encouraging all financial planners to participate in upcoming shadow shopper workshops, irrespective of their opinion on the results of Australian Securities and Investments Commission’s (ASIC) shadow shopper survey.
The FPA, in conjunction with ASIC and the Financial Ombudsman Service, will address ASIC’s latest shadow shopper results in a series of workshops throughout the country in May.
Rantall said that while he understood many financial planners were not happy with the results of the survey, it was important they took the time to find out what the report was designed to do, what criteria ASIC used in reaching its findings and what the specific outcomes were.
"Without taking the time to get the level of knowledge to understand the background behind the report, it’s a bit difficult to draw a conclusion one way or another, so we’re encouraging people to come and see and hear first-hand what those requirements were," he said.
Rantall said the workshop would explore the criteria ASIC used in reaching its findings, the outcomes of the shadow shopping exercise and address gaps identified in the financial advice process.
"This is a very rare opportunity for our own members and all other financial planning professionals to gain first-hand insights from the regulator, the ombudsman, the professional body and leading practitioners," he said.
Rantall said that while the industry has seen improvement since the 2006 shadow shopper survey, the passage of time had shown the need for further improvement as illustrated in the recent survey.
"The whole idea of this is not to stay static and to move forward, so the objective is really to ensure that we continue to grow and learn in terms of the advice process such that any future shadow shopping surveys will have a better result than what we’re currently achieving," he said.
