In an increasingly busy marketplace, AccountantsIQ and I Love SMSF have partnered to launch a program aimed at easing the burden of the Financial Advisers Standards and Ethics Authority (FASEA) professionalisation requirements, particularly regarding the professional year.
StrategistIQ would provide guidance for mentors of new entrants that were both straight out of uni or late entrants to the advice profession, while also providing support for qualified planners faced with the new exam and ethics requirements.
Speaking at the product’s launch however, I Love SMSF founder, Grant Abbott, took an interesting approach to the exam, suggesting that planners should do the online exam together, as with experts working on it the three plus hour exam could be shaved down to just a couple of hours. This presumably would not be in line with FASEA’s intentions in setting it.
“We’ve made it very practical, knowing that the new entrants are very FASEA-focused and that’s good, but what we’ve recognised is that there are experienced people [who are changing careers] who need something highly engaging and highly practical,” AccountantsIQ founder, Bronny Speed, said, also at the product’s launch.
This “practical overlay” included a mentoring scheme where each FASEA requirement for the professional year mentoring was broken down into work activities that were then matched to FASEA competency areas, resources, and logbook entry requirements.
It would also provide participants with the opportunity to specialise in self-managed superannuation funds (SMSFs), aged care, and portfolio construction, with Speed saying that other specialisations could be added later.
Abbott also warned at the launch, with support from the room, that “FASEA makes their own law … and what they put in a required course is virtually God’s will … so it’s a very scary situation for all of us”.
