The One Thing CFP Professionals Need to Succeed Right Now

 By Taylor Liao, CFP, Chinese Taipei
原文網址:http://www.financialplanet.org/2013/cfp-professionals-practice-knowledge/

CFP professionals are held to different education standards around the world. This is due to the differences in language, law and tax rules in the 24 territories where CFP certification is offered. One of the challenges that prevents students from earning their CFP certification in the first place and stops CFP professionals from renewing their certification is how to start a fee-based consulting practice. When people observe others giving up on CFP certification, they give up too and it causes a negative cycle leading to less CFP professionals overall.

Instead of focusing on training new people to pass the examination, FPSBshould put more effort into helping existing CFP certificants become successful in their practices. Passing the CFP examination only provides the minimum knowledge to be a financial planner, but to be a really competent planner, one needs ongoing education to gain knowledge about practice management. This is the reason CFP professionals struggle in my territory; they lack practice knowledge. I feel strongly that the education material needs to be more practical.

To earn CFP certification, one has to do 240 hours of training. The training program includes six modules: tax, investment, insurance…etc. All of the material is theoretical and most of the time, the teachers don’t have any experience in actual practice. So, almost all new professionals have little to no knowledge of how to start their careers as fee-based planners when they receive their certification. I remember when I got my certification, I only had knowledge about the six steps of financial planning: establish relationship, gather data, etc.

Challenges Facing Financial Planners

There are only a few financial planning firms in Taiwan and to be frank, it is hard to treat financial planning as a profession at the moment. Not many people are willing to join the planning practice right now because of all the challenges they have to overcome, including charging fees and mastering standard operating processes (SOPs).

Practicing financial planning requires a vast skillset that includes financial analysis, insurance, investment, law, taxes, etc. It’s hard for one person to be skilled in all these areas. Some people have focuses in financial planning and insurance, but aren’t necessarily good in all areas. There are only 1,100 CFP certificants in Taiwan right now and we are struggling to be successful for this reason.

Some people may argue that it is natural to gain experiential knowledge after the exam through CPD. Unfortunately, the CPD courses offered don’t fit the needs of CFP professionals who need practice knowledge because the profession is only 10 years old in Taiwan. Taiwan only became a Member of FPSB in 2003 – this is not enough time for the financial planning profession to mature. Financial planning firms are not yet well-established and only a few independent advisers are pursuing the challenge of forming a large scale business in a market that doesn’t support the industry. With only 10 years of experience, there is not a lot of expertise to share to new professionals.

According to FPSB’s 2011 Stakeholder Report, FPSB has 24 members worldwide and they all run separately. The total count of CFP Professionals in 11 of FPSB’s territories equals less than 1,000 people. I wonder what problems these 11 territories all share. Are they facing the same problems Taiwan is? Our biggest problems is that CFP professionals are struggling to establish successful fee-based businesses and the certification organization,FPAT, has difficulty maintaining a membership of only 600 CFP certificants.

A World Class Standard

If the financial planning profession wants to have a world class standard, FPSB must play an active role to do something to help to grow the profession in each territory. FPSB has 24 members around the world, and over 147,000 CFP certificants (as of 12/31/2013). It would be so great if CFP certificants shared their experiences and learned from each other. FPSB is in a good position to act as the worldwide resource center for CFP professionals.

When reviewing the 24 territories that offer CFP certification, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia all have decades of experience. They should be sharing their expert knowledge so professionals around the world can benefit. Professionals from these territories could discuss and share their opinions on topics such as finding new clients or communicating with clients. This information could be delivered as an e-learning course that is accessible through a protected website.

The easiest way for FPSB to grow CFP professionals globally is to empower and create mediums for professionals to exchange their knowledge, therefore I would like to see FPSB build a website with the following functions:

A global resource center: This could be a place where financial planning materials are shared: data gathering forms, financial planning books, etc. I think it could be like an app store for CFP professionals. Everyone has something to offer – a video, an article, etc. The local organizations can validate whether the information is suitable to publish according to the standards set by FPSB. The cost of the material could vary and could be shared between the author and the organizations.

An e-learning center: This would offer a wide range of CPD courses covering a variety of topics regarding the financial planning practice. An issue Taiwan faces is a shortage of trainers since the industry is so young. 

薪水少也許你可以存下來的錢會比較少，但是它不能做為不存錢的理由，因為很多高所得的人，如果沒有計劃一樣是存不下錢來。如果沒有一套有計劃存錢的方式，不少人會發現他們收入不錯，但是沒存下太多錢，因為收入多，花錢也不手軟，賺多也花得多，可能一段時間之後檢視自己的財務狀況，才驚訝的發現：以自己的年收入來看，每年應該可以省下更多錢來做儲蓄與投資的，但是因為沒有為自己訂定一些財務目標，也沒有有計劃的控制自己的消費，不知不覺的錢就這樣花掉了，5年、10年下來才發覺自己的資產：銀行存款、基金、股票等金融資產累積的金額，跟自己的收入完全不能符合，以自己的收入照道理應該存下更多錢、擁有更多金融資產才對。

所以可以存下多少錢，真的跟你的收入多少沒有絕對的相關性，關鍵不在於你收入的多少，而是在於你有沒有有系統、有計劃的來管理你的財務。當你可以利用這樣的管理，讓你養成一個存錢的習慣的時候，長期下來你就會看到你的資產逐漸的累積，不再是賺多少、花多少，沒有為未來的財務目標的需求做任何的準備。

要做有計劃性的理財，第一個步驟就是清楚自己金錢的流向，進一步才能做收支的控管，讓自己可以把省的下錢用來做儲蓄與投資。在前面幾次的文章，我們也談到了要用記帳把花費記錄下來、輸出成月報表、把資料做分類與分析後，來做收支的控管。

曾經碰過一位客戶，她的問題是：丈夫發生意外，結果數百萬保險理賠金都被娘家與夫家的人拿走，害得她需要下班後去打工維持生計，她問到，保險金信託是否可以多一層保障？

在財務規劃上，確實會需要利用到信託來做一些規劃，以前有滿多人一談到信託，想到的都是利用信託是否可以用來節稅。在某些情況信託是可以達到節稅效果，但是在多數的情況，恐怕是其他的功能會大過於節稅的需求。

信託在什麼情況會發揮很好的效果？例如：身心障礙信託、保險金信託等，它的主要用意都是在照顧下一代。

信託之基本成立要件就是財產所有人（委託人：例如父母親），將其財產權（信託財產：例如現金、保險理賠金、有價證券等），移轉或設定於有管理能力、且足以信賴之人（受託人：例如銀行），使其依信託本旨為一定之人（受益人：例如子女）之利益或為特定之目的，管理或處分信託財產。委託人透過信託的形式，把財產移轉到信託之下，並且在信託契約內容中規定，如何利用信託財產來照顧受益人。

這樣的好處是因為信託財產已經不在委託人名下，而是轉移到受託人的名下，可以避免此財產被侵占、挪用等等。財產在受託人保管下，依照信託契約內容的約定，可以每個月提供生活費給受益人、或是其他委託人希望照顧受益人的方式，而且是在委託人身故後，這樣的照顧方式可以一直延續下去，不致於因為委託人不在了，受益人的生活就受到影響。

信託是一種財產管理與保全的制度，而信託業者屬於公正的第三者，可以維持財產的獨立性，委託人在移轉財產到受託人後，除非委託人原本有債務，而信託財產存在之物權、或是委託人在移轉信託財產時有侵害債權的行為，否則原則上信託財產不能被強制執行。

因為有了這樣的獨立性（非委託人的財產，不能被債權人強制執行等），因此它可以貫徹父母保障孩子餘生的心願，更可減輕其他家人的負擔。

既然是信託財產，它就必須注意到信託財產有其公示性，才能表彰它的信託之性質，因此應該登記或註冊之財產權為信託，例如：

1. 不動產，信託登記。
2. 有價證券–
2-1. 銀行存單，要在證券上或其他表彰權利之文件上，載明為信託財產。
2-2. 股票或公司債為信託者，還應該通知發行公司，以便讓發行公司明瞭其為信託財產。
3. 現金，應要求受託人在銀行開立信託專戶存放之。
4. 保險金，應於保單中列明受託人在銀行之信託專戶帳號，並要求保險公司直接將保險金匯入該帳號。

為了達到照顧下一代的目的，有兩種型式的信託是比較常見的：保險金信託與他益型保險金信託，而第一種也是可以用來做身心障礙者的信託規劃。