According to the Sydney Morning Herald,
“The National Australia Bank has quietly paid millions of dollars in compensation to hundreds of clients given what it considers inappropriate financial planning advice since 2009.
The bank is the latest institution to face disturbing revelations of misconduct in its financial planning division, with a Fairfax Media investigation uncovering instances of forgery, “rogue advisers” and multiple sackings inside its financial advice arm.
A cache of confidential internal documents obtained by Fairfax Media reveals that, according to NAB, 31 of its financial planners were terminated, suspended or had their resignations “ensured” due to conflicts of interest, inappropriate advice, inappropriate practices or repeated compliance breaches
Disturbingly, the document states that these instances were not detected by the bank’s internal controls, but through client complaints or queries by authorities”.
This is further evidence that the financial advice sector is not up to scratch, and that despite the FOFA reforms (which has been subject to various government attempted revisions) we think that there is still room for significant improvement in the regulatory framework, practice and culture relating to providing good financial advice in Australia, with a focus on doing the right thing for clients. The claim that “its just a few bad apples” becomes less credible as more organisations are implicated. Both ASIC and the recent FSI report highlighted significant structural problems. Remember the superannuation balances of Australians now stand at more than $1.93 trillion.
We think that the concept of general advice should be removed, and advisors should not be able to receive any indirect financial benefit from the advice they provide. Separately, financial products can be sold, provided all relevant facts, and costs are disclosed. The two – advice and product sales, should be separated completely. You can read my earlier discussions here.
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