AMP awaits endgame on FoFA as clock ticks

The financial planning industry continues to battle a ‘reasonable degree of uncertainty’ as it awaits the final details of Future of Financial Advice (FoFA) reform.

The complete legislation will only emerge once it passes through the Senate later this month and the regulator underpins the reforms with guidance to the industry.

While AMP CEO Craig Dunn believes it is professional associations rather than independent licensees who will lead the way in the post-FoFA landscape, he stresses that there is little certainty.

Dunn was speaking at a media event in Sydney this week with AMP’s financial services managing director, Craig Meller, who said the company had been strong supporters of the Financial Planning Association (FPA).

“Our natural inclination would be that the professional body that can deliver the accreditation, in this case CFP, should be the code of conduct holder,” said Meller.

However he added that the ongoing uncertainty over the final shape of FoFA remained a concern.

“You like some certainty when running a business,” he said. “In theory, the law still says FoFA will apply from July 1 this year. The Minister has said he will delay it but we haven’t seen any legislation passed.”

Meller added that AMP would then need to look at the regulations that underpin the legislation before also getting an understanding on how the regulator will approach its mandate.

“For us, speed is as important as the final nuances of the legislation,” he said.

“The extent to which your systems are automated or manual is as much a function of the time you have as anything else.”