Intra-fund advice class order hardly used

The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) has been told that the class order clearing the way for superannuation trustees to provide intra-fund advice has received little take-up in the time it has been available to the sector.

However it has been suggested the class order relief might have been more widely used if it had allowed fund trustees to grant access to related entities or other Australian Financial Services Licence holders.

In a submission to ASIC dealing with guidance on the scaling of advice, the Association of Superannuation Funds of Australia (ASFA) acknowledged that the intra-fund advice class order was likely to be revoked as a result of the Government's Future of Financial Advice (FOFA) legislative changes.

The ASFA submission said the organisation accepted that the class order would be revoked "as it is clear that the take up for the class order has been low and that the full impact of the FOFA legislation is yet to be seen".

"However, it has also been pointed out that if the trustee model for accessing the relief was changed to one that allowed the relief to be accessed by another AFSL provider or related entity of the trustee, then the relief might be more widely used," the submission said.

Elsewhere in its submission, ASFA pointed out to ASIC that the FOFA legislation would make elements of its consultation paper providing guidance on scaled advice redundant.