The common financial planning practice of sending general newsletters to clients, including recommendations to seek assistance with issues creating uncertainty, such as the COVID-19 relief instruments, is unlikely to constitute a breach of the anti-hawking provisions regarding early super release advice, an SMSF Association discussion panel has said.
During the industry body’s most recent webinar on the coronarvirus, SMSF Association chief executive John Maroney acknowledged concerns about this topic as valid given this is what most client newsletters aim to do – provide information and then encourage people to contact the advisory firm if more detail is required.
“I would think if you’re not bending the rules of sending unsolicited emails and people have agreed to receive it, then you should be on fairly safe ground,” Maroney said.
Fellow webinar panellist Smarter SMSF chief executive Aaron Dunn agreed with Maroney’s assessment about the scenario.
“If you’re providing a broad base of information to your clients generally about regulatory changes, JobKeeper, or whatever the case may be, and you also include information around [the early release of super], I couldn’t see how [this activity] could extend right out to the fact that you’re trying to solicit work there,” Dunn said.
“I think that would be a very long bow [to draw] and I wouldn’t think that would be what the intent of the hawking rules [are about].”
SuperConcepts technical education services general manager Peter Burgess, also part of the webinar panel, concurred with this conclusion, but pointed out some situations could still be troublesome.
“If you’re there to say ‘look, I’m here to help and I’m here to provide services to help you through these times’, I certainly can’t see any issues with that,” Burgess said.
“Where [the information] starts to become more specific in relation to the release measures and things like that it might be a little different.
“But where you’re providing general assistance, I don’t see any issue with that.”
