New financial service register to open

Commerce Minister Simon Power. Photo / Mark Mitchell

The Financial Service Providers Register opens on Monday and Commerce Minister Simon Power is urging people in the industry to register with it.

The opening of the register marks the start of the transition to full implementation of the Financial Advisers Act and the Financial Service Providers Act, and once fully implemented, they will require all financial service providers, including advisers, to be registered.

If they provide services to the public, they are also required to be a member of an approved dispute resolution scheme.

"Financial advisers in particular will also be subject to new minimum standards of disclosure, competence, conduct, and accountability," said Power.

"This regime is essential if we are to have a financial sector which investors and investment product providers can have confidence in."

Power said the requirement to register applied to a wide range of financial service providers, and anyone in doubt about whether it applied to them should seek legal advice.

* Financial service providers must be registered and must belong to a dispute resolution scheme by December 1. Financial advisers who may be working under a qualifying financial entity or whose qualifying financial entity is still awaiting approval have until March 31 to register.

* The Acts come fully into force on July 1. All financial advisers who need authorisation from the Securities Commission must have completed their training and finalised their authorisation by then.

- NZPA