18th September 2012, 08:12 PM
kevin wooldridge Wrote:If your employer is an RAO and is failing in its duty to provide the facilities such as CPD required by RAO status you should in the first instance ask your employer why that is. If they continue to fail to undertake their committment, you have the right to complain to the IfA. You don't have to be a member to do so...and there is no charge. (Not quite sure where you got that idea from!!). It seems that the resolution of this matter is entirely in your and your colleagues hands, if you care enough to do something about it.
The IfA says that it recommends the use of its quality assured (my emphasis) Registered Organisations. Quality assured surely means that there are both rigorous codes of professional conduct and practice in place and that the IfA ensures that these standards are continuously being met through effective assessment and inspection.
If the IfA are serious that the RO scheme provides a ‘kite mark’ of quality and good practice then the onus must surely fall to the IfA to ensure that ROs are meeting the requirements that they set. It should not be the responsibility of employees (who may not even be members of the IfA) to monitor standards of ROs or to tell the IfA that standards are not being met. If there are ROs out there who are, for example, not providing CPD as required by RO status then the IfA must surely have failed in its monitoring role.
If there is no effective assessment and inspection of standards (and Oxbeast's example suggests these aren't working on the ground) then what is the point of RO status?