Information on the Financial Advisers Register

The Financial Advisers Register contains information about relevant providers (also known in the industry as financial advisers). Relevant providers are individuals authorised to provide personal advice to retail clients on relevant financial products and may include provisional relevant providers and time-share advisers. For more information see Definitions that apply to personal advice providers.

Australian financial services (AFS) licensees are responsible for appointing and maintaining the details of their relevant providers they have authorised on the Financial Advisers Register.

AFS licensees are also responsible for registering their relevant providers (including time-share advisers) with ASIC. Provisional relevant providers cannot be registered.

Relevant providers details

When an AFS licensee appoints an individual to the Financial Advisers Register, the AFS licensee must provide the following mandatory information about the relevant provider:

• date of appointment to the AFS licence
• given name
• family name
• date of birth
• country of birth
• country
• street number
• street name
• street type
• city/suburb
• postcode
• state/territory
• email address (not publicly displayed on the Financial Advisers Register)
• relevant provider role type:
• relevant provider (financial adviser)
• provisional relevant provider (professional financial provider), or
• time-share adviser.

The AFS licensee can provide the following additional information about the relevant provider:

• representative number
• Australian Business Number (ABN)
• other given names
• state/territory of birth, if in Australia
• suburb/city of birth, if in Australia
• principal place of business:
• building/property name
• floor/level
• unit/office
• phone number (not publicly displayed on the Financial Advisers Register)

When any of this information changes in relation to a relevant provider, the AFS licensee who authorises the relevant provider must update the Financial Advisers Register within 30 business days.

Relevant financial products

Relevant financial products are all financial products except:

• basic banking products (basic deposit products and a facility for making non-cash payments)
• general insurance products
• consumer credit insurance, or
• a combination of any of these products.

When an AFS licensee appoints a relevant provider to the Financial Advisers Register, they must authorise them to provide advice to retail clients on at least one of the products on the list of ‘relevant financial products’: see Table 1 below.

A limited AFS licensee can only authorise a relevant provider to give advice about.

• self-managed superannuation funds (SMSFs)
• a client’s existing superannuation holdings in certain circumstances, and
• ‘class of product’ advice about securities, simple managed investment schemes, life risk insurance products and superannuation products.

The relevant financial products a relevant provider can provide advice on, must not exceed those of the AFS licensee, or the organisation that the AFS licensee has authorised to provide advice – for example, a body corporate.

Table 1: Relevant financial products

Recent advising history

Provide the relevant provider’s advising history as a relevant provider for the last five years. This does not include their current employment.

Only previous as a relevant provider should be included. Do not include periods where the individual was working as a paraplanner or Q1 and Q2 of the provisional relevant providers year of work and training.

If the relevant provider has been employed by the current AFS licensee for more than five years, you do not need to provide any further information on their recent advising history. If the relevant provider has been employed by more than one licensee during the past five years, provide details for all licensees where the individual was employed as a relevant provider.

The details for recent advising history include:

• previous AFS licence number
• authorisation start date
• authorisation end date

The Financial Advisers Register displays the current AFS licensee name. If an AFS licensee has changed its name since the employment period in the history, you can search for the licensee using its AFS licence number, which stays the same.

Qualifications and training courses

Provide information on the qualifications and training courses that a relevant provider has completed relevant to providing financial services.

Up to 20 qualifications and training courses can be included on the Financial Advisers Register. The AFS licensee should also indicate which qualifications, course and/or units of study goes towards meeting the qualifications standard set out in section s921B(2) of the Corporations Act.  For more information on the qualifications standard see: Qualifications standard.

The details for qualifications and training courses include:

• the type of course (AQF level)
• name of course
• provider/institution
• year attained
• whether the qualification, course and/or units of study goes towards meeting the qualifications standard (see note 1).

Note: Existing qualifications that are marked as a qualification, course and/or unit of study that goes towards meeting the qualifications standard cannot be edited. They must be deleted and re‑added with the correct information.  

For more information on how an AFS licensee should assess the qualifications of a relevant providers and input this information into the Financial Advisers Register see: Assessing relevant provider qualifications.

Ability to provide tax (financial) advice services

Provide information on whether the relevant provider can provide tax (financial) advice services, including the capacity in which they can do so.

This option is not available for time-share advisers.

To provide tax (financial) advice services to retail clients, a relevant provider must:

• be permitted by their AFS licensee to provide tax (financial) advice services, and
• satisfy the requirements of a qualified tax relevant provider. 

See Information Sheet 268 Relevant providers who provide tax (financial) advice services (INFO 268) for further information.

Continuing professional development (CPD) requirements

Provide information on whether the relevant provider failed to meet their CPD requirements:

Failure to meet CPD requirements is displayed on the Financial Advisers Register as:

[DD/MM/YYYY] – failure to meet annual requirements for continuing professional development was notified.

Professional memberships

Provide information on the relevant provider’s membership of any professional bodies relevant to providing financial services.

Up to five professional memberships can be included on the Financial Advisers Register.

If the professional body is not listed, the AFS licensee can add the name of the professional body to the Financial Advisers Register.

Updating information on the Financial Advisers Register

When a relevant provider’s details change, the AFS licensee must update the information on the Financial Advisers Register within 30 business days. This includes information on the relevant provider’s ability to provide tax (financial) advice services, their qualifications and training, authorisations or professional memberships. See Maintain (update) or correct a relevant provider’s details.

If you have concerns about information for a relevant provider authorised under another AFS licence, see what you should do.

A relevant provider’s registration status on the Financial Advisers Register

Information relating to a relevant provider’s registration status will also be displayed on the Financial Advisers Register. AFS licensees must register their relevant providers with ASIC before they provide personal advice to retail clients.  

For more information see Registering a relevant provider.