Estate Planning is destined to become one of the most important and exciting facets of financial planning over the next decade, in part due to our rapidly ageing population. An understanding of this specialised discipline is essential to providing comprehensive planning advice to your clients.

Trimester 3 enrolments (for unit 1) close 22 October.  Please see workshop dates below or click here to receive an application form and program brochure.

Completing the FPA’s Accredited Estate Planning Strategist (AEPS) Program will not only advance your knowledge in this essential discipline, it will identify you as a specialist professional to your clients, peers and licensee, and will give you a professional edge in a competitive marketplace. As part of the FPA’s professional education suite, it can also act as a stepping stone towards CFP^® Certification.

Becoming an Accredited Estate Planning Strategist will lead to increased satisfaction for your clients:

• Estate Planning encourages your clients to talk about their personal values and goals on a deeper level, leading to greater satisfaction from the financial planning process
• Your clients will feel a sense of achievement from planning for their family’s future, and leaving a valuable legacy for the next generation

The Estate Planning designation will also lead to a more financially and personally rewarding career allowing you to:

• Demonstrate that you can meet the full range of your clients' planning needs
• Increase your ability to generate higher and more diversified fee based advice income
• Insure your business against an ageing client base, by building multigenerational relationships with your clients’ descendents
• Advance your qualifications while learning more about this fascinating specialisation
• Promote your designation on business cards and letterheads
• Deepen the pool of specialist practitioners and recognised professionals in your business
• Earn a Certificate of Completion from the UTS Law School which can be used as credit towards a university degree
• Assist in satisfying the international Society of Trust and Estate Planning (STEP) practitioners’ criteria

Assistance in applying the technical knowledge gained in this course is offered by Estplan Pty Ltd on a consulting basis. Estplan has developed a specific business model for advisers to follow. This is supported by client engagement skills, mentoring and business skills training. Business skills, communicating with clients, families and clients’ business partners, and collaborating with other professionals, are key skills for successfully delivering estate planning advice. Achieving the designation, which includes a requirement to prove three years of acceptable experience with a peer review, as well as completion of education units 1 and 2, will prove your successful integration of both your client engagement skills and technical knowledge, the two important elements in providing this service.

The FPA Specialist Accreditation Programs are designed for FPA practitioner members, both Associate Financial Planners (AFP) and CFP^® professionals, who have demonstrated, through experience, education, examination and ethics, their eligibility to use an FPA granted, post nominal designation - AEPS – Accredited Estate Planning Strategist.

Enrolment eligibility

Pathway 1 - AFP members

Pre-requisites:

a. Must be a current AFP member AND

b. Must have achieved, as a minimum, an Advanced Diploma in Financial Services (ADFS) or approved equivalent . Those with a higher education qualification in a finance related area (e.g. degree, masters) will also be accepted following application to and approval by the FPA

Pathway 2 - CFP professional members

Pre-requisites:

a. Must be a current CFP professional member

Note: CFP professionals and AFP practitioners, who have not previously completed CFP 1 of the CFP Certification Program, are required to successfully complete this unit.

If you are not a member of the FPA but wish to enrol in the dedicated estate planning education unit (2) you may be eligible to enrol pursuant to the following two additional pathways:

Pathway 3 – non member: CA, CPA or practicing lawyer

Pathway 4 – other non members

If you are not a member of the FPA and do not satisfy the non-member criteria described in Pathway 3 above, you may also enrol in AEPS education unit 2 on providing evidence on enrolment of your satisfaction of the education pre-requisites described in b) under Pathway 1 above. Satisfaction of the education pre-requisite is a condition of your enrolment in unit 2.

Not currently an FPA member but want to gain the AEPS designation? To earn the AEPS designation you will need to become a practitioner member of the FPA and satisfy all other criteria as detailed above. Practitioner membership can be applied for at any time in your progress to achieve the AEPS designation.

Course and workshop dates 2010:

Unit 1 - CFP 1 (distance learning)

Unit 2 - Estate Planning (face-to-face workshops)

* As of 19 April dates have been changed due to the public holiday on Monday 4 Oct.

Other States
Courses will be run in other states subject to demand and your expression of interest is encouraged. Click here

The Program

In order to gain the AEPS designation you must complete two units of study, submit evidence of your specialised and review your evidence with two estate practitioners who will be chosen by the FPA.

The first unit of study is made up of four topics incorporating ethics and professional practice. The completion of this unit is only required for those FPA practitioner members who have not previously completed CFP 1, or an acceptable alternative unit of study on Ethics and Professionalism.

The second unit in an in depth estate planning unit, developed by the University of Technology (UTS) Sydney. It has ten topics, covering the full depth of specialist estate planning advice. Once your study has been completed, you will also need to provide evidence of three years full time (or equivalent part-time) experience in providing advice in this specialised area and review your submission with two approved estate practitioners. The AEPS designation can only be awarded after all four of these criteria have been met. Assistance will be available to candidates who require mentoring and guidance in the satisfaction of the experience criteria.

Unit 1 – Ethics, professionalism and professional practice (CFP1)**

This unit forms the foundation of the CFP Certification Program and its completion will allow you to continue studying towards becoming a CFP practitioner.

Course content includes:

• Topic 1: Ethics and ethical decision making
• Topic 2: Professional practice
• Topic 3: Professional responsibility
• Topic 4: Professional accountability

To find out more about enrolling in the CFP Certification Program click here.

Unit 2 – Estate Planning (UTS Estate Planning unit 79026)

This unit will reward you with the knowledge and skills to offer detailed and complex estate planning to your clients.

It is a mandatory requirement that students attend workshops to complete this unit. The assessment process is a formal examination and the submission of responses to various assignment tasks.

Course content includes:

• Topic 1: Introduction to Estate Planning
• Topic 2: Management and Operations
• Topic 3: Wills Probated & Succession
• Topic 4: Taxation of Estates
• Topic 5: Property Equity & Trusts
• Topic 6: Contracts and Business Structures
• Topic 7: Responding To Family Breakdown
• Topic 8: Responding To Changes in capacity and cognition
• Topic 9: Estate Planning in action
• Topic 10: Estate services and the professions

Completing this course will earn you CPD points.

Course fees (inclusive of GST) are:

*non member pricing has been adjusted as of 15 June 2010

Estplan 2 day workshop

The new 2 day General Practitioner Estate Planning course (run by Estplan and supported by the FPA) is suitable for planners who do not intend to offer estate planning all the time but who need to know much more about their clients’ estate planning needs, current documents and situation. This two day course provides an introduction to estate planning issues and will help you decide if it is an area you want to do more work in. Doing this course also provides recognised prior learning if you wish to then go on and complete the six day course as part of the FPA Accredited Estate Planning Strategist program, which is an advanced course.

The two day Estplan General Practitioner Estate Planning course will allow you to:

• Identify a range of estate planning and management issues that apply in Australia today
• Identify the range of advisers needed to meet a client’s estate management objectives
• Identify funding, legal, tax and other issues within the scope of case studies presented
• Identify strategies for effective estate planning, administration and eventual transfer of wealth
• Prepare a written estate strategy plan.

Register for the 2 day workshop online here, or for more information including course structure download the guide.

Become an AEPS and you’re on your way to becoming a CFP^® practitioner

The first unit of the Accredited Estate Planning Strategist (AEPS) program is also the first CFP Certification unit (CFP1) so, if you hold an Advanced Diploma of Financial Services (Financial Planning), you will be eligible to continue the CFP Program throughout subsequent trimesters.

Not currently an FPA member but want to earn the AEPS designation?

Simply submit a membership application form at the time of enrolment and you’ve taken the first step towards gaining your accredited designation and proudly demonstrating your commitment to becoming a specialist professional.

* AEPS designation can only be obtained upon completion of an ADFS or equivalent. If you have not yet completed an ADFS qualification then we can work with you via our professional partnership with ANZIIF to combine those studies with the AEPS program.

** Only required for those practitioner members who have not previously completed CFP1 or an FPA approved equivalent program on ethics.

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CFP^®, CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™ and are certification marks owned outside the U.S. by the Financial Planning Standards Board Ltd. Financial Planning Association of Australia Limited is the marks licensing authority for the CFP Marks in Australia, through agreement with FPSB.