Does your IFA have a Statement of Professional Standing?

New figures published by Money Marketing show that five accredited professional bodies have issued nearly 13,000 statements of professional standing, leaving 63% of financial advisers needing to obtain one of these by the end of the year.

Every financial adviser will need to hold a Statement of Professional Standing (SPS) by 31st December 2012, as one of the requirements of the Retail Distribution Review.

This annually renewable certificate, issued by an accredited professional body, demonstrates that any adviser has met the new qualification and competence standards.

In order to obtain a Statement of Professional Standing, an adviser must first hold a Level 4 professional qualification and also ‘gap fill’ any missing knowledge to ensure they meet new standards of competence.

This continuing professional development gap filling process can vary in length between advisers, depending on the specific qualifications they hold, but is typically a lengthy task requiring a lot of CPD activity.

Those 63% of advisers who plan to continue working from 31st December but have not yet obtained a Statement of Professional Standing are leaving things very late.

Whilst we understand the accredited professional bodies are making plans to cope with a last minute rush of applications, leaving it until now to obtain a Statement of Professional Standing sends a very poor message to clients about levels of commitment to professional standards.

If your financial adviser has not yet obtained their Statement of Professional Standing, you should ask them about their plans to do so and also what impact this workload will have on their ability to provide you with an ongoing service.

As you might expect, every Financial Planner at Informed Choice holds a current Statement of Professional Standing from the Chartered Insurance Institute (CII).

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