FICS / FOS changes: FSG reissue & Constitution
From 1 July 2008, the Banking and Financial Services Ombudsman (BFSO), Financial Industry Complaints Service (FICS) and Insurance Ombudsman Service (IOS) will consolidate their operations to form a national Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS).

Financial services providers are required by the Corporations Act and ASIC RG165 to provide retail clients with details about their right to pursue a complaint with an external complaints scheme and how to access that scheme. One consequence of the creation of FOS is that references to BFSO, FICS or IOS in existing PDSs, FSGs and other brochures will not be accurate. 

Rather than require the printing of new disclosure documents to accommodate this change, FICS has, after discussions with ASIC, applied to ASIC for relief, so that financial services providers will have a period of 12 months from 1 July 2008 to reprint their disclosure documents with the correct details. SDIA has supported FICS in this initiative.

In May, SDIA was invited by ASIC to comment on the draft Constitution for the new scheme, FOS. In our response we made the following points:
- the removal of the right of members to disallow Rules is opposed and will impact on the member support;
- SDIA is not recognised as an industry body as it was under the FICS Constitution;
- termination provisions are excessive and punitive; and
- interpretation issues will arise through not adopting terms defined in the Corporations Act.