Is the Proposed FASEA Exam Fair?

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Do you think the proposed FASEA exam represents a fair assessment for existing advisers?
  • No (81%)
  • Yes (11%)
  • Not sure (8%)

Our latest poll shifts debate back to the FASEA education standards and the proposed qualifying exam for advisers.

In emphasising this poll is concerned with the proposed education and qualifying standards FASEA will require of existing advisers, we’re asking you a fundamental question.

Last time, we asked whether you think you could pass the proposed FASEA exam. This time, we’re simply asking whether you think the proposed exam is fair for existing advisers.

In the last week, the AFA has told its members it has met with the Minister for Revenue and Financial Services, Kelly O’Dwyer, for the purpose of relaying its members’ concerns with the proposed FASEA National Exam (see: O’Dwyer to Relay Exam Concerns…), and the the Minister is relaying those concerns to the FASEA Board.

In claiming that no other profession was solely reliant on a single exam as the measure of a practitioner’s ability to operate (and, by implication, add value), the AFA’s concerns include issues related to:

  • The content of the proposed exam
  • The lack of preparation materials
  • The lack of practice exams that are intended to be made available
  • The exam being ‘closed book’, especially in relation to Chapter 7 of the Corporations Act
  • The duration of the exam – up to four hours

At one level, this could be the debate:

Position 1: Just get on with it

Any existing adviser worth their salt could easily achieve a 65% pass mark that tests them on their chosen vocation (see: FASEA Releases Draft Adviser Exam Guide).

Position 2: The proposed exam  is unfair

Neither the proposed exam nor the minimum proposed education standards sufficiently respect or take into account the high-quality standards of advice and client service that can only be achieved by advisers through many years of actually walking the talk.

This is a challenging discussion that will not offer a silver bullet solution. We hope you can take the conversation from here and we’ll come back to you next week…



2 COMMENTS

  1. I am constantly amazed at how many people stand up on their podium and tell the world that change is a constant and we need to just get on with it and stop complaining.

    OK, let us look at the Australian Car manufacturing industry and ask them if Government policy was a benefit to the Industry and all those thousands of Businesses and employees who worked in it.

    Oh sorry, we cannot ask anyone, because the Industry collapsed and we no longer produce cars in this country.

    It is not about just getting on with it.

    It is about fighting stupid policy or laying down and losing your future, as if anyone believes that Government and all the institutionalised public servants, have ANY IDEA of the real world, then you are living in a bubble.

    My Business has NEVER LOST a fight with Big Life Companies who have tried to do the wrong thing by our clients and this has only occurred because we don’t just accept stupid or intransigent policy, we fight it.

    • And now ASIC want to put their own staff into private business’s (banks). This type of government intervention sets a dangerous precedent. Have look how APRA regulated the Banks and lending criteria for the “benefit” of the Aus public. It was recently revealed that the changed from APRA resulted in consumers paying an extra $500 million on their mortgages. How was this to the benefit of the public?

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