Compare Models - RISE Standards RISE Standards

	Broughan & Vaux Endless Rise	Other Private Financial Planning Dealer Groups	Large Institutions Banks, Credit Unions Life Offices
Professional Indemnity	RISE covers Professional Indemnity Insurance and it is incorporated in the annual AR fee. It is not an additional fee.	This is the Dealer Groups obligation; however some Dealer Groups may not include it in their annual fees. It could be an additional cost passed on to you.	This is the Institutions obligation; however some Institutions may not include it in their annual fees. It could be an additional cost passed on to you.
Maintaining Your Independence	We are a privately owned Financial Services company with our own Australian Financial Services License (AFSL). We are advice driven, not product driven. We encourage you to maintain your independence so in your client’s eyes you are still seen as the adviser. We do not require branding guidelines to promote our own business.	Dealer Groups should have their own AFSL. Due to this, you should be receiving independent advice and should be able to maintain to a degree your own independence as a group.	Institutions have very controlled environments. As part of being an AR under a large institutional license you can be assured that independence will be offered but not necessarily given. Platforms and products will be offered to your clients and also strict guidelines on their own licensee branding on all of your marketing material and stationary that relates to being an AR and is given to your clients.
Ownership of the clients	RISE Standards Your clients will always remain your clients. If you decide to leave our license in the future, there are no restrictions inhibiting you from doing this.	Dealer Groups Some Dealer Groups may place restrictions on you moving your clients to another licensee in the future.	Banks, Credit Unions, Life Offices Institutions may place restrictions on you moving your clients to another licensee in the future.
Administration Support	RISE provides very comprehensive administration support. Our AR model RISE Standards has been built on the back of this. The quality is of a very high standard just as it would be if we were providing it to our own clients. Before we provide any administration, compliance or advice documents to you to present to your client, it will go through our strict check and review process. Also, your own brand will be located on the documents not RISE.	Most of these Dealer Groups do not offer administration support. Instead they offer administration templates and documents placing the onus on you to produce these. That includes compliance documents that are critical to get right. Having to produce these documents can be very time consuming and costly. It usually requires hiring administrative staff with experience in order to manage it.	The Institutions appear to be offering administration support. The only problem with this is that from our own experience, the quality can be very poor. Not only this but their branding will be very prominent especially if they are producing these documents for you.
Paraplanning Support	RISE provides experienced in-house paraplanning. We produce advice documents for the AR based on the requirements you have provided us from client consultations. If your client requires investment advice or risk insurance advice we provide this in conjunction with your own recommendations. From time to time we out source paraplanning but only if necessary and this is a cost that’s built in. An example of why we would do this is if we had a concern regarding the turnaround time for production being aware of client service levels. RISE would always review these documents before they were given to the AR for their next consultation.	Some Dealer Groups provide this either in-house or outsourced. It is sometimes bundled within an AR’s annual fees or an additional fee per document being produced.	The Institutions mention this is provided but it is not clear what those fees are. Paraplanners from institutions may also be inexperienced and still being trained so the quality can be poor. This can place pressure on the AR to review the work to ensure it is up to the standard they require. Most experienced paraplanners work for private financial planning companies.
Technical Support	The RISE adviser network will be available for technical assistance. AR’s are encouraged to contact our advisers for technical help. RISE will also provide an alternative outsource for technical assistance if advisers are unavailable and the AR requires assistance immediately.	This should be provided either from someone who works in the Dealer Group; or the Dealer Group should provide an alternative that is outsourced. Either way it should be offered and covered under the AR fee.	Institutions may have an in-house technical consultant or they would also outsource this requirement for their AR’s.
Industry training online and in person	RISE provides individual and group training in person. We have three parts to the training that we cover with the AR to ensure they have a good understanding. Some key areas we cover are compliance, the AR’s new responsibility, the advice documents, the appointment process and RISE Standards ongoing client management. In future, we will also be providing this training via our website.	Most Dealer Groups offer training. Some offer it online via a website and some offer this training in person. Some Dealer Groups don’t offer just the Authority to advise. Be aware that the quality of the training can vary quite significantly as can the level of comprehensiveness. Quality training will be the key to success in your new role as an AR.	Institutions appear to be offering a lot of support and training but it is the quality of the training and trainers that should be questioned. Poor training can lead to a misinterpretation of this information and result in problems down the track.
Professional Development	Similarly to your current ongoing education requirements as an Accountant, an AR must accumulate at least 30 professional development points each year (under ASIC guidelines) in order to maintain their ability to provide advice. RISE will provide several options for ongoing professional development that will include the attendance of training seminars and industry seminars. In future there will also be an option to complete these online too.	All Dealer Groups offer this. The quality and relativeness to the AR is unknown including the frequency of these sessions throughout the year.	The Institutions offer this. The quality and relativeness to the AR is unknown including the frequency of these sessions throughout the year.
Compliance Monitoring	As RISE will be producing all the advice documents on behalf of the AR, compliance will be checked straight away as part of the advice document preparation process. RISE have also engaged an external compliance consultant to conduct independent audits of AR files twice yearly as a minimum or as needed. The independent audits although thorough and comprehensive, will be relaxed in nature and seen as a great opportunity to learn more about the advice process.	All Dealer Groups offer this. It is their responsibility to maintain all compliance requirements in relation to advice that an AR provides. Some licensees will have an in-house compliance manager specifically hired to manage this and that person may attend to the audits too. Some Dealer Groups will also outsource the compliance audits through an external consultant.	The Institutions will provide an in-house compliance manager for this. Because of the large emphasis they place on protecting their license, their guidelines can be very stringent. This in turn can affect the AR by limiting them in certain areas of advice and sometimes place onerous compliance monitoring on the AR that effects turnaround time and as a result poor service levels to the client.
Product Driven	RISE use very few investment products. Where possible we invest directly. We have found this has reduced underlying management costs significantly, is transparent and has improved returns at the same time. This has given the client a much better result overall.	Some Dealer Groups are still persuaded by volume based revenue and incentives to ward particular investment and superannuation platforms. New AR’s may also be pushed in this direction unwillingly and as a result potentially lose their independence to a degree.	Institutions are product driven. Although they may allow you to use other platforms and products other than their own, they don’t provide the AR with many options. Along with this, they will often make alternative options more expensive by increasing the management fees resulting in it being unjustifiable for the AR to recommend to clients. Institutions will always try to persuade an AR to use their products in order to increase their own revenue. They are product and commission driven.
Commission Driven	RISE provides advice on a fee for service basis and have been doing so since starting the business. The only commission we earn as a group is via risk insurance. You can be assured your clients will receive advice based on the work required rather than any commission earned.	As of July 1st 2012, Dealer Groups and AR’s will not receive trail commission on new clients in relation to super and investment products. However a Grandfathering rule will still apply to those clients brought on before this cut off date. Dealer Groups should give an AR the choice of whether they charge commission or fee for service before the cut off date.	Because of the changes in legislation, Institutions will struggle to move to fee based advice. This will affect any AR that provides advice under their license as the transition could create all sorts of administration process breakdowns which will ultimately be passed on to the AR.
Access to Client Information	We provide this support to the AR via a secure internet based system that can be accessed 24/7 with your own login. Information can be seen by the AR but not updated.	This should always be provided to the AR.	This should always be provided to the AR.
Login to view client reports	RISE will also provide the AR access to this information 24/7 via their own login.	This should always be provided to the AR.	This should always be provided to the AR.
Marketing	We have a dedicated team to assist with this. We will jointly help you to execute marketing exercises to your client base and offer advice where applicable.	Services limited or not provided.	They might help with this.
Business Development Agreement	RISE offers a Business Development Agreement option. We believe it is important to reimburse the AR for their time and assistance in supplying the information needed, in order for RISE to produce the advice documents. It also assists the AR to recover the costs of its new addition to the business. The Business Development Agreement is optional. RISE do not require an AR to have this.	Services limited or not provided.	Services limited or not provided.
Ability to gain authorisation other financial planning areas	YES! We are happy to assess this on a case by case basis.	Most Dealer Groups offer this opportunity.	There are Institutions that offer this.