90% of FPA, AFA members have renewed with FAAA since merger

Of the 8,946 practitioner advisers who belonged to either industry group before their April merger, 8,093 have renewed their membership with the merged entity. The FAAA was “very pleased” with the 90 per cent renewal rate, its CEO said, urging stragglers to renew before a grace period ends next month.

Ninety per cent of former Financial Planning Association (FPA) and Association of Financial Planners (AFA) members have renewed their membership with the Financial Advice Association of Australia (FAAA) since its April inception from the two industry groups’ merger, the FAAA announced Friday.

According to Sarah Abood, chief executive of the FAAA, a total of just under 12,000 advisers were members of either the FPA or the AFA across all categories prior to the merger, 8,946 of whom were practitioners. As of Friday, 9,525 of those members had renewed with the FAAA, including 8,093 practitioners – a 90 per cent renewal rate.

The announcement followed a Thursday post from financial planning research firm Wealth Data analysing Australian Securities and Investments Commission data on the Financial Advisers Register (FAR), which put FAAA membership lower than the group’s total by a more than thousand, at 7,851. That’s almost exactly half of the 15,712 advisers currently registered in Australia.

Wealth Data founder Colin Williams explained that the FAAA had recently submitted its records to ASIC to update advisers’ membership details under an agreement that allowed licensees who renewed by a bulk cutoff date earlier this month to avoid a $36 fee, saving members $280,000.

Williams noted that in April, shortly after the merger was finalised, Wealth Data had estimated the total potential membership universe of the newly created FAAA at 8,835, based on advisers who had indicated on the FAR pre-merger that they were members of either group.

“Since then, quite a few of those advisers have ceased, and a few may well still be in the process of finalising their membership with the FAAA,” Williams wrote. He also noted that 95 advisers were still listed on the FAR as members of either the FPA or AFA.

‘Very happy’ with the numbers

In her announcement Friday, Abood said the FAAA is “very happy with how the numbers are tracking” – particularly the 90 per cent renewal rate – and explained the discrepancy between the FAR data and the FAAA’s own statistics showing 9,525 members.

The FAR uses ASIC data representing current practitioners who had renewed their FAAA memberships before the bulk cutoff date, she said. It therefore doesn’t include practitioners still in the process of finalising their membership renewals or those who have left the register but still belong to the FAAA, such as non-practicing and retired members.

“We are very appreciative that ASIC supported the profession by agreeing to do this bulk update as a one-off, saving licensees hundreds of thousands of dollars,” Abood said.

“We encourage any advisers who haven’t yet done so to renew their membership,” she added. “The grace period for renewals ends at the end of September, so there is still time to renew membership before it lapses.”