Aviva Financial Adviser Academy - for IFAs or ... who?

agarnett

I stumbled upon this Continuous Professional Development (CPD) certificate which seemingly is just an Aviva brand emblazoned piece of paper that FAs are invited to complete with their own words and use to satisfy some higher authority as proof they are studying their subject?

Seems a bit odd?

You often see it argued in this forum that IFA's aren't any longer paid by commissions from providers like Aviva ergo they may assert that they are truly independent - not strictly true if many advisers are still living off annual trail commissions going back to the bad old days, but hey ... how does it really hang these days?

Sometimes you can read on MSE where IFAs freely admit that most pensions business is placed with providers (like Aviva) via the advisors.

Presumably the advisors have to prove their professional qualification to the provider before they are allowed to place business? Years ago there used to be formal "agency agreements" which were not easy to obtain. In the years before that (60s and 70s) there were agency agreements that were very easy to obtain, but most of those got cleaned up in the 80s. Are they getting easier to obtain again via some channels?

AXA/Friends Life (now merged with Aviva) effectively bought the Sesame network of financial advisors via their acquisition of Friends Provident. I have never quite understood what that network was exactly either, except that it seemingly employed over 500 people at Friends Provident and later proved to be a thorn in Friends Life's side, having suffered FSA fines for misselling, and later in 2013 they were actively trying to sell it, but then the Aviva/Friends Life merger occurred in 2015 so how's it all supposed to sit now?

Self-certification of CPD smacks a little of self-certification of other sorts which got roundly abused in the financial services arena ...

What exactly are we looking at? And exactly what purpose does it serve? Who checks a certificate like this? Is it a "memo to self", or just something you can fill in with any words you fancy, then print and frame and put on a wall behind your desk at the surgery? What exactly?

The Sesame network still exists under Aviva ownership as far as I can make out.

Whenever I think about what Sesame might be, I can't help thinking about the old Spar network of local corner shops - not big enough to be an independent major supermarket, but part of a network that supplied the goods and enabled small shopkeepers to play at being bigger than they were?

How many IFAs rely on being members of the Sesame network in the UK? What proportion of all IFAs is that? Do they buy their Professional Indemnity insurance through Aviva too?

Looks a bit fake and incestuous from some angles, doesn't it?

ex-pat_scot

A few facts.


IFA = Independent = offers Whole of Market.
Sesame Bankhall Group are indeed part of Friends Life Group, now Aviva. They provide a "network" for small groups and individuals of FAs and IFAs - systems, processes, compliance support, marketing, HR assistance etc.


FLG did indeed want to sell. You are indeed right that there were a number of high profile fines - and these were believed to be set high based on the financial strength of FLG to be able to pay.


I suspect that SBG does not remain a strategic ambition of Aviva Group, but I am not aware of many potential suitors now or in 2013.


Qualifications and CPD. (Forgive my high level view of this, as it is not my qualification.)
- Aviva academy is a training programme / support run for FAs across the industry.
- post RDR (1/1/2013) FAs have had to upskill to higher qualification level.
- qualification provider requires a certain element of CPD each year.
- generally (not my institute) they require clear evidence of training hours, training logs, as well as an element of on-the-job learning, wider study and research. Traditionally a form such as the one you link is used to capture general objectives and learning outcomes, and is not used as formal certification of attendance / success. Whether someone puts it on their wall? Never seen that.


Independence. The requirements in order to class yourself as IFA are onerous, as you have to offer Whole of Market. Most are Restricted, which means they don't have to consider some of the exotic options available to customers (such as private equity).
There are some very stringent record keeping requirements that ensure IFAs are clear and transparent about which products they recommend - it would be a brave person to deliberately favour Aviva if it were not transparently the best option for their client. This would be picked up through file checking and the aforementioned compliance file reviews.
Since RDR, fees are charged rather than commission. So the IFA should be agnostic to the product provider and there should be no inherent bias or conflict of interest. As such, the suggestion that somehow an IFA working through the SBG network would be preferring / pushing Aviva (or FLG) products seems a little out of date.


Of course, that's my rose-tinted view of the world (oh look - over there - bunnies and unicorns!!!!).

dunstonh

Sesame Bankhall Group are indeed part of Friends Life Group, now Aviva. They provide a "network" for small groups and individuals of FAs and IFAs - systems, processes, compliance support, marketing, HR assistance etc.

They ceased offering network services to IFAs in around 2011 and they withdrew from investment business totally in 2015. They have no FAs or IFAs.

Qualifications and CPD. (Forgive my high level view of this, as it is not my qualification.)

CPD is a requirement in many professional areas. Lots of different sources available but it has to meet criteria set by the professional body. That professional body will check a sample of individuals each year. Compliance inspectors will also check to see CPD is being carried out and meets criteria.

I unignored the post and saw it was full of misinformation, incorrect details and wide of mark assumptions. A complete load of garbage as are most of his posts.

agarnett

Quite interesting how Aviva sees itself as a provider of CPD education materials to FAs, and self-certification materials perhaps for those who want blue and yellow interlaced shipshape CPD files for when the compliance man knocks with his tickbox forms

Meantime maybe we can all start out on the road to pensions knowledge and learn some from the exam practice papers Aviva so kindly publishes: http://www.aviva-for-advisers.co.uk/adviser/site/public/building-your-business/financial-adviser-academy/technical-knowledge# (scroll down a bit and click on Exam Support).

fairleads

dunstonh wrote: »

I unignored the post and saw it was full of misinformation, incorrect details and wide of mark assumptions. A complete load of garbage as are most of his posts.

I beg to differ

dunstonh

fairleads wrote: »

I beg to differ

What a surprise. You are married to AG arent you?

agarnett

dunstonh wrote:

I unignored the post and saw it was full of misinformation, incorrect details and wide of mark assumptions.

He won't see this unless he unignores my posts again, but he really ought to state

• what is misinformation
• what is incorrect details
• wide of mark assumptions

My original post wasn't so long that it contained too many points to answer or correct.

There seem to be so many types of advisers out there and as a pensions customer, I no longer have a flippin clue as to their affiliations i.e. who says they are qualified and stay qualified.

Who are the professional bodies, and what are the typical qualifications?

When I was in insurance we had ACII and FCII (with CPD requirements) and later we started seeing lesser qualifications introduced to satisfy the speed at which life and pensions business salesforces were put together and needed to be out on the street fast with letters after their names to impress the punters.

fairleads

dunstonh wrote: »

What a surprise. You are married to AG arent you?

No, married Mrs Fair Play many years ago

mgdavid

fairleads wrote: »

I beg to differ

we respect your right to be wrong.

agarnett

mgdavid wrote: »

we respect your right to be wrong.

... so are you using the Royal 'we' now? My goodness, I think you are, Ma'm - I can see dunstonh hails from Norfolk, but do tell us you aren't co-habiting at Sandringham?

bowlhead99

agarnett wrote: »

I stumbled upon this Continuous Professional Development (CPD) certificate which seemingly is just an Aviva brand emblazoned piece of paper that FAs are invited to complete with their own words and use to satisfy some higher authority as proof they are studying their subject?

Seems a bit odd?

Is it a "memo to self", or just something you can fill in with any words you fancy, then print and frame and put on a wall behind your desk at the surgery? What exactly?

Essentially yes, it is a memo to self.

If at some point later your professional body would like to question what you have done to consider your development needs and how to meet them, and what practical steps you took or what you learned, and reflect upon the effectiveness of what you have done in the context of your objectives and plan of action, it will be useful to have recorded what you did and when as part of a bit of training or development activity.

CPD is expected in most professional fields whether you're in law or accounting or other regulated areas where passing an exam one time can't be presumed to be all you need to do to keep up with the latest changes in regulations, business environment etc.

Where an advisor has chosen to record some of his continuing professional development through a 'memo to self' template such as this, it is unlikely that he is going to frame a whole stack of them to substitute for wallpaper in his office.

Presumably the advisors have to prove their professional qualification to the provider before they are allowed to place business? Years ago there used to be formal "agency agreements" which were not easy to obtain. In the years before that (60s and 70s) there were agency agreements that were very easy to obtain, but most of those got cleaned up in the 80s. Are they getting easier to obtain again via some channels?

As advisors don't get paid commission for selling products for the provider your thinking is probably a bit old fashioned. If you want to act as an intermediary /introducer to buy a product for your client, you can probably just tell the provider that you are an FCA regulated financial services business with appropriate permissions to do that. You would not be expected to dig out your old GCSE certificates or swimming badges or swathes of internal documentation to evidence that you were keeping up with the CPD requirements of your professional body.

Whenever I think about what Sesame might be,

And how often do you think about what Sesame might be? Does it bring you happiness or pain? Across this set of forums there are no doubt some people who work in the field of psychiatry or counselling, hopefully someone can take you off for a lie down on a couch and you can let out all your worries.

Looks a bit fake and incestuous from some angles, doesn't it?

Looks like the same old tripe being peddled by a man who doesn't like financial services businesses and who from his position of a low knowledge base would imagine all kinds of things about them so he could call them all dirty, fake or incestuous without regard to facts.

Meantime maybe we can all start out on the road to pensions knowledge and learn some from the exam practice papers Aviva so kindly publishes: http://www.aviva-for-advisers.co.uk/adviser/site/public/building-your-business/financial-adviser-academy/technical-knowledge# (scroll down a bit and click on Exam Support).

Yes, as you clearly have lots of time on your hands, why not do that? Might be more interesting than being grumpy on a forum.