Financial Planning Standards Council (FPSC) has introduced a new Continuing Education (CE) Approval Program, which aims to streamline the approval process for education providers that meet the continuing education requirements of CFP professionals.
The program also provides CFP professionals with assurance of approved CE credits when choosing their CE activities.
CFP professionals have an obligation to ensure that their knowledge and competence remains current. To renew their CFP certification, they must attest to having completed 30 hours of CE activities every year. At least 20 of these hours must come from third-party documented sources. Up until now, FPSC did not approve in advance the various continuing education offerings in the marketplace. The new program now enables FPSC to do this.
“The new CE Approval Program eliminates the guesswork for both education providers and for CFP professionals. Education providers can now promote their activities as ‘FPSC-approved’ for a specified number of credits in their marketing materials and CFP professionals can confidently choose appropriate CE activities, with assurance they will meet their annual requirements,” says John Wickett, senior VP, standards & certification.
How it works
CE providers that register with FPSC’s online program submit their offerings for review to ensure they reflect the CFP Professional Competency Profile. Once approved, providers can promote the offering as “FPSC-approved” and convey the number of CE credits that will be awarded. All FPSC-approved CE Activities will also be listed on the FPSC website for easy searching by CFP professionals. CFP professionals who complete at least 20 credits through approved activities will not be subject to audit, and their approved CE activities will be automatically updated on their Dashboard.
FPSC says it will promote FPSC-approved CE Activities to Canada’s 17,500 CFP professionals through e-mails and online messaging as well as on the CFP professionals’ private dashboard event listing.
“The CFP professional community requires over 350,000 hours of verified CE activities each and every year. The Fall tends to be a busy season for CFP professionals earning their CE credits,” says Wickett. “Now is the time for CE providers to get on board by registering with FPSC to have their activities approved in time for the upcoming season when CFP professionals tend to plan their CE activities.”