Commercial law firm expands accountants’ licensing services
One commercial law firm is set to launch a digital Statement of Advice (SoA) program as part of its existing limited AFSL compliance portal.
Cowell Clarke’s online compliance portal, Cowell Clarke Connect, was first launched in February this year and was developed to provide compliance policies, procedures and end-user documents required by licensees.
Cowell Clarke partner Catherine Evans said the additional service for the portal, an online prompted fact-find and auto-generated SoA program, will be operational in June.
Ms Evans said many of the firm's clients had voiced concerns about the cost of preparing advice documentation and said they wanted an easier process for providing SMSF advice under the limited licence.
“The issue with templates is that they do not contemplate each situation and need to be amended, in some cases significantly, to reflect the advice provided,” said Ms Evans.
“The original template document may also be merged or changed over time into a document which is no longer compliant.”
The new service, she said, will help accountants “realise cost efficiencies in documenting advice”.
Read more:
ASIC cautions SMSFs after land banking schemes' downfall