Licensee loses AFSL for inadequate PI cover
Peter Joyner and Associates has lost its Australian Financial Services Licence (AFSL) for failing to maintain adequate professional indemnity (PI) insurance, among other reasons.
The financial planning company, with offices in Balgowlah and Manly, was run by Allan Radcliffe Joyner and provided financial planning advice to retail clients, according to the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC). The company’s AFSL was cancelled following surveillance and a hearing by ASIC, which revealed that it had breached a number of its financial, reporting and other obligations as a financial services licensee in contravention of the Corporations Act 2001, including failing to maintain adequate compensation arrangements. ASIC also had reason to believe that the company might continue to breach its obligations under financial services laws and that it had also provided information regarding its compensation arrangements for retail investors to ASIC that was misleading or deceptive, ASIC stated.
“It’s essential consumers have confidence that the financial advisers they deal with are fully complying with their legal obligations and AFSL conditions,” said ASIC senior executive leader, consumer, advisers and retail investors, Delia Rickard.
“Licensees that fail to maintain adequate PI insurance expose retail clients to the risk that they go uncompensated in circumstances where a licensee has insufficient funds to meet client claims.”
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