More than a year after the Code Working Group was first convened, the final code was signed off by Commerce Minister Kris Faafoi on Tuesday.

The final code was a much simplified version of that consulted on through the working group’s development process – particularly compared to its first consultation.

There are just nine, high-level, standards.

Katrina Shanks, chief executive of Financial Advice NZ, said it was disappointing the code did not require a minimum standard for everyone providing regulated financial advice.

It also still allows nominated representatives to rely on their providers' processes to demonstrate they have the met competence standards.

“A key objective of the new regime is to build public confidence and trust in the financial services sector: ensuring that New Zealanders deal with qualified people is an absolutely crucial component in this,” Shanks said.

“The final code will set up a two-tiered system of advisers: a mandatory qualification for ‘individual’ financial advisers, and ‘equivalence’ for nominated representatives. In our view, this does not best serve New Zealanders.”

She said she was also disappointed at the lack of clarity around CPD requirements.

There had been calls for the code to introduce a minimum number of hours required of CPD each year.

Shanks said a commitment to CPD was a cornerstone of professionalism.

Adviser Murray Weatherston said he was delighted that the code had lost its “apple pie and motherhood” aspects. Including the requirement to “do the right thing” by clients.

Such sentiments would have been unworkable in an advice business, he said.

But he said what was left was underwhelming.

“At the end of the day what we’re left with isn’t every much.”

He said he expected gaps to be filled with a series of guidance notes from the Financial Markets Authority.  “In its simplicity it doesn’t have much guts. It’s the sort of thing that someone might have been able to sit down and write on the first day they met.”

Adviser Simon Hassan said the code left room for professional associations to impose their own standards on members.

Partners Life managing director Naomi Ballantyne said the code was “light” and it was disappointing that there was no particular focus on replacement business. She said attempts to tackle the issues through broader, less precise rules, had not been successful so far. “A code that doesn’t focus on that issue is too generic to be useful.”

She said she did not think the code added anything to the regulation that was already in existence.

Sovereign and AIA chief executive Nick Stanhope said it was a good principles-based approach to how advice should be given.