The Financial Planning Association (FPA) is on the verge of scrapping the requirement for Certified Financial Planners (CFPs) to be employed by an Australian Financial Services licensee that is a Principal member of the FPA.
The move has come after concerns over the current structure were highlighted by members over the past 18 months.
“It’s been raised by CFP members because some of them would like to be able to maintain their CFP status if they moved to an advisory group that is not an FPA member. People who are non-CFPs and want to pick up the CFP status but aren’t working with a Principal member of ours have also brought the issue up,” an FPA spokesperson said.
The FPA board is aiming to implement the change as of July 1, 2007, after a period of member consultation.
However, future CFPs who are not employed by an FPA Principal member will have to pay an additional fee over and above the standard membership subscription to cover the additional costs to the FPA of enforcing professional standards among the greater advisory community.
“A substantial number of financial planners who are currently in the Non-Practitioner or General category because they are not linked to an FPA Principal member will now be able to upgrade their FPA membership,” FPA chair Corinna Dieters said.
“Importantly, the decision to de-link also means that financial planners who are representatives of licensees who are not among the FPA’s 600-plus Principal members are free to join the FPA as practitioner members and to seek CFP certification,” she added.
The FPA also feels it will give those members with a CFP designation more certainty as they will no longer have to contemplate changing their professional status when switching financial planning practices.
