Product manufacturers can help police bad planners

Product manufacturers should be prepared to play a role in weeding out the bad apples who give the financial planning industry a bad name, according to the chief executive of Colonial First State, Brian Bissaker.

Speaking on a panel at the Financial Services Council annual conference on the Gold Coast, Bissaker said that while primary responsibility for maintaining the good name of the planning industry might reside with organisations such as the Financial Planning Association (FPA), product manufacturers could also play a role.

“It is in the nature of their operations that product manufacturers collect a lot of data on activity around their products and that can be put to good use,” he said.

“Perhaps it is simply a case of more product groups asking more questions and passing the results down the line,” he said.

Bissaker had earlier warned that the planning industry should not underestimate the scale of the changes being imposed as a result of the Government’s Future of Financial Advice changes, or their ultimate cost.

“I am concerned that in the heat of the debate the totality of the reforms is being lost and consumers may be denied financial advice because of this,” he said.

Bissaker said that while there were those who suggested that ‘opt-in’ was very simple, this failed to recognise the gravity of the situation.

He said imposing an opt-in requirement on planners by law turned what might have been very simple into something that was very tough and costly in terms of compliance.

Earlier, the chief executive of the FPA, Mark Rantall, acknowledged the challenge confronting the planning industry in being recognised as a profession, but pointed out that his organisation was already well-advanced in terms of the standards it was setting for itself.