Industry consultant and training provider, Jim Stackpool, is behind the launch of a new specialist advice designation, intended to help consumers identify professional advisers.
The Certainty Adviser (CA) designation has been developed by Strategic Consulting and Training (SCAT) to differentiate advisers with the right skills and approach to remove financial complexity and deliver certainty for clients. To coincide with the launch of the designation, SCAT has been rebranded as Certainty Advice Group. The CA designation has been trademarked with IP Australia and is in the process of gaining a certification mark from the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC).
In order to obtain the designation, advisers and accountants must meet three key criteria:
- They must serve the public good
- They must not receive any revenue or accept any financial benefit from a product or service provider
- They must adopt the fee and disclosure guidelines set out in the Accounting Professional and Ethical Standard Board’s originally proposed APES 230 standard (which broadly outlaws commissions for all products including risk insurance and third-party payments)
Membership of Certainty Advice Group is $4,000 per year, and CAs pay an additional $1,000 to maintain their designation. The fees cover the cost of biannual audits, online forums, practical articles and content, ongoing support, and potentially client leads. Advisers must regularly provide evidence that their advice and practices are aligned to the Certainty Adviser model. They must also foster a collaborative culture of knowledge sharing and encouragement. Over time, there must also be quantitative evidence of customer satisfaction.
We want to reinvent advice and educate consumers about what advice should look like
Mr Stackpool said the new company name and designation reflected the group’s sharper focus on partnering with advisers who specialise in the removal of uncertainty. Certainty Advice Group’s mission, said Mr Stackpool, was to make advice irresistible and lay the cornerstone for an improved, compelling advice proposition.
“We are continuing SCAT’s work of helping advisers build productive, scalable and profitable practices only we have much bolder and ambitious goals,” he said.
“We want to reinvent advice and educate consumers about what advice should look like and ultimately deliver. In most cases, it will bear little resemblance to what they’re likely to experience today.
“So far we are happy with the consumer reaction. Since the launch of my financial advice book for consumers last year, we’re now getting 2000 hits per month on the book site. We introduce relevant enquiries to our certified advisers as part of our approach.”
Certainty Advice Group said it aims to attract over 100 advisers to the designation, and encourage them to talk widely about the value they add to clients’ lives. There are currently 20 advisers with the CA designation, including Perth-based advice firm The Wealth Designers.
“Our mission is to add greater financial certainty to peoples’ lives and change the negative perception of the financial advice industry,” The Wealth Designers General Manager, Paul Heatley, said.
“It won’t be easy which is why we need to gather a group of accredited advisers working together to get the right message out there.”
The new designation will be officially launched at the group’s Cultivating Advice Conference to be held in Sydney this week.
