Financial services providers (FSPs) are feeling the burden of financial training and compliance more heavily than ever before, as their representatives scramble to meet more rigorous experience and formal education standards under the Financial Advisory and Intermediary Services Act (FAIS). Any FSP that fails to meet the mandates of the Act, which stipulates a certain level of compliance by as early as the end of this year, will lose its licence and face censure in the financial services community.
In response to the pressing demand for financial advisory training, online training leader, EquityOnline, has launched an online compliance training portal to provide a welcome solution to a host of the training and compliance issues currently faced by thousands of financial advisors. By 31 December 2010, an estimated 140 000 individuals offering financial advice in South Africa are required to pass the level 1 FAIS 'Fit and Proper' regulatory exam. Following that they have to pass further regulatory exams and undergo continuous professional development (CPD) in order to provide any form of financial advice to clients - from offering home loans to selling cell phone contracts and store credit cards.
“For an FSP, the prospect of rolling out immediate and continuous financial advisory training to all of your key individuals and representatives offering financial advice can seem very daunting,” says EquityOnline founder Craig Reid. “The cost of hiring professional trainers can be prohibitive, and there is a shortage of qualified financial trainers to meet industry demand.
“To address this need, we have developed a highly effective online financial training platform, which is far more convenient and cost-effective than hiring in-house trainers. EquityOnline is particularly suited to financial institutions that are required to manage large representative teams across a number of different product lines.”
The portal delivers regularly updated, comprehensive content for the 'Fit and Proper' regulatory exams. It structures each module by pre-testing the content to engage the learner, before presenting the module's content in detail. The user is free to go through the content at their own pace, and is then tested for understanding and areas of difficulty, to help ensure retention and subsequent exam success.
EquityOnline also provides verifiable CPD content and records training hours, and can be tailored to deliver any other training required by an individual company, from sales and marketing to staff orientation.
“The platform monitors and reports on usage in real time for FAIS compliance and audit purposes. EquityOnline takes the hassle out of reporting, which is a necessary evil in the light of strict new corporate governance standards in South Africa. So, in addition to providing the mandatory FAIS and CPD training for your staff, the platform can help ensure that many of your compliance officer's responsibilities are taken care of,” says Reid.
EquityOnline's core online training solution has a proven 10-year track record and is currently being used successfully by a number of multinational and listed companies operating in South Africa. The portal supports candidates through its call centre, which operates six days a week.
For more information about EquityOnline, visit www.equityonline.co.za.
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