Govt releases ‘experienced pathway’ exposure draft
The Government has released an exposure draft of the regulations which will underpin the “experienced pathway”.
The new arrangements, as outlined in the exposure draft, involve:
Experienced financial advisers who have completed a minimum of 10 years full-time equivalent experience and have a clean disciplinary record, are not required to complete an approved degree, or complete one or more courses, determined by the Minister.
They are still required to pass the exam and comply with continuing professional development requirements.
The Minister may approve one or more ways of satisfying the conditions for an approved qualification. This provides greater flexibility to new entrants, recognising that there may be different study pathways available to satisfy the education and training standard
New entrants with a domestic qualification may apply to the Minister for individual approval, where that person has completed an approved qualification, as determined by the Minister in the Approved Qualifications Determination, but not met all the conditions attached to that qualification.
Financial advisers who are also registered tax agents are not required to meet the additional education requirements to be a qualified tax relevant provider.
The exposure draft explanatory materials said current transitional arrangements mean that existing financial advisers have until 1 January 2026 to meet the qualifications standard, while continuing to provide financial advice.
It said the new legislation amends the Corporations Act to insert new transitional arrangements for experienced financial advisers with a clean disciplinary record.
These new transitional arrangements provide that financial advisers who meet the criteria for an ‘experienced provider’ are not required to undertake further study to meet the qualifications standard.
If an individual does not meet the criteria for an ‘experienced provider’, they will need to undertake further study, as required under the existing transitional arrangements, to meet the qualifications standard by 1 January 2026.
It said experienced advisers will have to make a self-declaration that they meet the criteria
Please let me know who I am to send my exhorbitant course fees to since I was (incorrectly) instructed by government that I HAD to do these courses to stay in the industry despite being 63 at the time I needed to be (re-)qualified…
agree 100% – what a disgrace. I too studied Grad Dip after 30 years of experience despite having many other qualifications. the experience pathway is simply bad policy and it should not happen. it’s all to appease a few who are not committed enough to study like everyone else. What a disgrace!
Agree, I have just applied for the very last subject – what a waste of my time and money. I am so angry that this was not put in place earlier.
But it has been ‘up in the air’ for years now. You could have held off for a period to see what the outcome was and then make a decision from there, much like many advisors have done. At the end of the day you have a degree so you really haven’t wasted anything.
Any reasonable professional would not “hold off” what if it didnt get overturned and you had 2 years to do 6 years of study
Well pretty silly to leave it THAT close. Common sense needs to prevail. If you have that many subjects then clearly you are nowhere near the requirements anyway so most likely you need to do study anyway. If you only have two or three bridging subjects (which I believe is the majority of people) then that shouldn’t take long at all. Given they have until the end of 2025, most people should be able to complete a few subjects in that time.
Agreed….. So much for ‘raising the bar’….
What the heck are you still doing in, at I’m guessing 66? Go and enjoy life.
In the process of selling up…hope to be out in the next 12 months!
Just turned 60…will be 63 in 2026 🙂
As someone who has passed the exam and spent the money and energy to complete the required additional courses, including the ethics requirement, this is insulting. It does not matter how many years of experience you have every financial advisor should be doing the ethics module at least. I do not see why I had to go through so much money, stress & energy and sacrifice my free time when others don’t.
So is your argument that the original ruling was good policy despite ignoring people with 30 years experience? Or do you just expect others to have to deal with the work and cost of bad policy because you did? I think most people would agree the original approach was far too heavy handed and poorly thought out. Taking a “I had to put up with it so they should too” approach shouldn’t be how we make decisions on moving this industry forward.
Perhaps Tim’s last sentance gives you that impression. However, I do think he is right about the “Ethics and Professionalism” course. I have been in the industry 35 years and despite being annoted that I needed to do all the extra study I feel I did benefit largely from doing the course.
It was also quite satifying telling compliance that they misunderstood certain laws during my lasy audit, and then being proved right.
The other subjects might be a waste of time and money for some of us who already have all the degrees, accreditations and diploma’s!
I too have a degree that covers most of the new requirements and am willing to complete the ethics course and the handful of others I’m told I need. I just don’t believe they will make any real difference to the industry. Completing an ethics course isn’t going to stop a dodgy planner being dodgy. That said, it seems most instances of “dodgy planners” in the last few years seem to relate to people not actually licensed anyway. With regard to issues arising from actual licensed advisers doing the wrong thing or making poor recommendations, these seem to be pretty overblown/rare these days and there are far more courses of action/remediation available to aggrieved clients than probably any other industry in the country (compared to say, the building industry).
Edward, I think what he and the majority of “quality advisers” are saying is that you need to get on board and help drag us towards a profession
Well, as someone who has only been in the “profession” 5 years I’m in no way impacted by these particular changes (should they be passed). I’m absolutely supportive of anything that will actually drive us towards professionalism. What I’m not supportive of however, is poorly constructed red tape that gives the appearance of doing so. The current rules are wildely inconsistent and, like so much of the regulation we have to deal with, are very unlikely to achieve their stated purpose. We (as a nation) seem to love more rules in response to problems, irrespective of whether they’ll actually fix them.
If they removed the rules for everybody I would be annoyed but I would accept it. What I am saying is there is no logical reason to exclude people with 10 years plus experience from those requirements. Why is there this idea that they are so incapable of getting through the courses. You might not want to hear this Edward but with all the changes that have been made specifically regarding ethical requirements, 30 plus years of experience doesn’t have as much value as you think in terms of modern ethics. People with 10 years plus experience are not infallible and should be held to the same standards and requirements as everyone else.
Do you agree that under the existing framework people with far more experience but a less recent degree were not being held to the same standard as everyone else? People with far more experience than me have had all experience and qualifications disregarded arbitrarily and required to do triple the work. Is that treating people fairly and to the same standards? The reality is the current framework was rushed through with completely unqualified people making “captain’s calls” about what constituted adquate degrees or experience for existing industry participants.
As the uni degree is not required until 2026, the end date must be December 31st, 2025.
This will maximise numbers that get the benefit.
Also if you have 8.5 years as a Adviser and 4 years paraplanning does this meet the requirements. It’s very vague as to what the experience is.
This is shameful as an industry that we lobbied to have this watered down so much.
Everyone should have just got on with it and moved our industry towards a profession.
No one who supports this should be allowed to call themselves a professional
Put a submission in, and simply state that.
Its funny how I have to spend time training our university trained planners about advice and that say they have learnt more in six months working with an adviser with over 20 years experience than they learned during their degree. The comments they tell me are clearly you learn more on the job over the years then during the degree. The shameful thing is not that experienced adviser that have remained compliant may not have to do as much to keep their business it is that government did this to the industry to begin without understanding the consequences.
I have currently 27yrs of REAL mkt experience. Have applied for and been given 4 AFSL’s, taught 2nd and 3rd Uni in 2002/2003. Have published a book about Derivatives and have two degrees – one in applied science geology and the other a Bachelor of Commerce. I have done thousands of CPD hrs. To have been told by the powers to be a few yrs back that mean’t fk all and I had to go and pass some BS diploma so I can keep doing what I have been successfully been doing was the greatest insult. It didn’t help that the stockbrokers at the time allowed the Financial Planners and Big Education to call ALL the shots.
As for making Financial Advisory a Profession like CA or CPA – that can’t ever happen while we’re handcuffed to AFCA. Professional bodies like CA & CPA give their members limited liability and that therefore makes AFCA unworkable because if Finanical Advisers had limited liability then we’d be free from Frankenstein AFCA
mate, you’re a stockbroker who I can’t find on the register a failed One Nation Party Candidate and someone whose FSG says can only provide Execution Only or General Advice. Not sure you belong in this debate
Listen to the sound of lawyers rubbing their hands together. Watch for the class actions from advisers that are out of pocket for (now) unnecessary further education and advisers who have left the industry claiming lost earnings. This is such a bad look – watering down legislation, aiming to promote professionalism, at time when corporate greed is off the dial.
But think of how much more professional they are and the extra value added to their lives by doing all of that (unnecessary) study!!!
In reality, the study requirement was bad legislation in the first place and for all of the “do the degree or you shouldn’t be able to live” cohort, the accept it blindly and getting on with it attitude has been the reason this industry has become the mess it has over the last 20 years odd.
FPA and AFA acceptance of stupid “professionalism” legislation making it more difficult to provide advice?
If us as advisers had put up some sort of a stand against such stupid legislation, maybe our industry would be more respected as a profession today…
“Accept it and get on with the program”? Bah humbug!
Yep, like everyone else what BS this is for those that put in the time and money. Aren’t we meant to have “cleaned up” our industry and made us more professional in the eyes of the public. This is a step backwards.
These are the same clowns that write laws saying you can’t give a client a fee disclosure statement prior to the anniversary date. I want my money back and I’ll be writing that in my submission. There is no mention of compensation and this legislation should only be amended if compensation is paid.
…but you have the value of a degree now!!
The issue I see here is that it took far to long to make a decision around this. I can bet those that have done the extra work (and good on them) would not have done that work had this decision been made two or three years ago. It is always easy to say ‘if only’. It is what it is and we just need to move on and get on with things. Considering the study value of the CFP course is actually higher than the education requirements proposed yet were basically rubbished for cross credits tells you that it isn’t and wasn’t about professionalism, it was about appearances. Let’s make it look like we are doing something to improve things. If they were serious then a lot more weight would have been placed on the CFP program. But then there is another argument for you all. How many advisers were given CFP status without needing to actually complete the CFP course. The answer……lots! That is no different to what we are experiencing here. I missed out on getting the Cornflakes packet CFP all because I started studying one semester too late, so I had to complete the course. Did I whine and carry on about it? No, I just got it done and that was it. There is always going to be change and some people will get an advantage and others won’t. That’s life! Importantly, new entrants have a set criteria with high standards to get into the industry and that is where it needs to start.
I Never expected that. I’m one of the 800-1000 planners it helps.
That being send the comments below are warranted.
A financial commitment, and time lost with family and friends studying weekends and nights. To better ones self.
And drive professionalism deserves respect. I simply didn’t (and don’t) have the energy to study. And accepted I would exit in 2026.
And probably still will.
Agree, never planned to do the studies, I think it was an insult, as if the studies, including CFP are worth nothing. Been a planner for 27 years and still enjoying my work, mentored many young planners, never had a complaint. The post-grad degree is certainly not the holy grail, I have followed my son doing this, it is very theoretical and does not cover the practical implementation and application of strategies which will benefit clients. I did the “old school” DFP 1-8 subjects, which was probably a lot more practical and went deeper than the so called Post-grad. I am weary about the planners coming fresh from Uni without any experience. And yes, 1 year professional year is a start, but certainly not the end. After all these years I am still learning, everyday. Althuogh I still might stop working in 2026, as one of the many who are planning to do this, at least I will have a choice and say in it.
What’s even more laughable is that the FPA/FAAA supported this amendment. Clearly they are out of touch with the views of their membership base.
I wrote directly the head of the AFA and he responded to me personally with an answer that contradicted his public response. Clearly just says what he feels he needs to say for that moment
About God damn time…and it took a Fed Labor govt to finally fix this charlie foxtrot that had been hanging around the necks of Financial Advisers for nearly 7 yrs.
I think this is really sad….we are trying to look like a profession, only to change the rules so many times that it is laughable. I vote that “unqualified” Advisers have to disclose this to clients. Surely we would not pay the same fee for a Lawyer that held no formal qualification. We are moving towards less compliance burden simply because we want to be seen as professionals – is it not a requirement to have the necessary qualifications to be able to call yourself a “Professional”. Like it or not we have had plenty of warning as to what was expected going forward – this is just a very big backward step.
I vote that anyone with a mickey mouse “FASEA approved” degree from a glorified TAFE has to disclose this to clients. Most clients would much prefer to deal with a true professional who made the effort to get a quality degree from a real university long before higher education was compulsory, even if it wasn’t “approved” by the incompetent and corrupt FASEA.
The really sad thing here is “trying to look like a profession”.
Maybe actually acting and being professional would make a change!
This is a great outcome!
I’m stick and tired of turning away prospective and existing clients, due to capacity issues or them no longer being a good fit for my business model.
Providing consumers this alternative to seek advice at a lower cost from an experienced Adviser, mitigates the risk of them receiving poor advice from finfluencers or cool centre staff.
While I feel for those who have completed further education it may have been more prudent to wait. There was always a strong, pragmatic argument to allow an experience pathway for those advisers who, over a long period of time, had acted in the best interests of their clients & demonstrated their professionalism by behaviours & standards.
Professionalism isn’t necessarily evidenced by credentials. Behaviours, maintaining standards, positive outcomes, & client satisfaction, can provide far better indication of an individuals standing.
I wonder if the Kaplan share price is going to tumble.
A point that seems to have been widely overlooked in the comments above, is that everyone still needs to have passed the exam. Nobody has been given an exemption from studying ethics or law or consumer behaviour. They had to do so to pass the exam. Many did so via self learning, or short intensive courses, or content in other degrees. Just because they didn’t pay to do a “FASEA approved” subject doesn’t mean they haven’t studied those areas.
Let’s not forget that FASEA misapplied the original well intentioned financial adviser standards legislation, to suit the biases and commercial interests of its board members. Jones’ “experience exemption” is partly about fixing some of that mess without having to start over again.
And for those seeking compensation or a class action, former FASEA Board members is who you should be targeting.
This is a huge blow to Financial Planning becoming a profession. An education standard is one criteria of a profession. We can’t have some advisers exempted from this; it brings everyone down. It isn’t equitable. It isn’t fair to the conscientious advisers that have completed the education. If an adviser can’t complete the 8 subjects in the time provided then perhaps they shouldn’t be an adviser. Everyone has other commitments in life, and completing the education should become priority as it is important to one’s livelihood.