Compliance marks high

That’s not, of course, to say everything is completely rosy in this area. “Oppressive, annoying, overdone and extreme” were also some of the words planners used to describe their firms’ legal and compliance departments.

Berkshire Investment Group Inc. and Investors Group Inc. tied for first in compliance with 9.4. This is the first year Berkshire was included in the survey. But some planners at the company expressed criticisms.

A Berkshire planner in Western Canada says he recently was informed by letter that his licence would not be renewed. The reason? “They said I was too remote for compliance,” the planner says.

The city in which this planner works has an airport and a population of about 60,000 people. The city is less than 170 kilometres from the regional head office.

Unaware of problems

The planner, who has worked as a financial advisor for 15 years, three of them with Berkshire, says he was unaware there were any compliance issues. The planner, who is in the process of leaving the company, suggests the problem may have been “personality related,” but says he can’t prove it.

A TWC Financial Corp. planner in Regina says, “I don’t know if they [legal and compliance officers] are right but they are not in the real world. They have a typical attitude such as that you see from a civil servant. They are a pain in the butt. They go overboard and are real nitpickers.”

A TWC planner in British Columbia complains that the company’s legal and compliance department regulate planners as if they were salespeople. Then, “they expect us to provide the financial planning function, too,” he says.

The problem today, many planners say, is compliance regulators have never operated businesses themselves. As a result, they have no concept of what the business entails.

One planner describes the hierarchy at TWC, saying that first in line is the client, then the independent representative, followed by the TWC employee and then the shareholder.

But the TWC planner in British Columbia says, “The regulator is ahead of the client because of their [the company’s] own regulations. Customers are impaired in terms of their money. They [customers] want to do things [with their money] but regulators make it inconvenient.”

But a great many planners had high praise for their compliance departments. One Toronto planner with CMG-Worldsources Financial Services Inc. says, “Legal and compliance is one of [the company’s] strong points.”

A Waterloo advisor with Balanced Planning Financial Group says, “That’s the part I like best about the company.”