Disclosure regs to be amended
By
Adam Smith
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17/08/2011 5:00:00 AM
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The MFAA is "very confident" amendments will be made to the recently released disclosure regulations.
In a Gadens Lawyers update, the firm's senior partner Jon Denovan has indicated that changes may be made to the regulations prior to the 1 October start date. He commented that there are also planned changes for the Key Fact Sheets which form part of the disclosure documents.
One mooted change to the regulations will concern the disclosure of panel lenders. Under existing disclosure requirements, licensees are required to specify their panel lenders, or, if the licensee has more than six panel lenders, the six with whom the licensee does the most business. The MFAA has proposed that disclosing the six biggest panel lenders could push customers toward these lenders, and may be difficult as lenders change from time to time.
As a result, Denovan said Treasury is considering amending the regulations to give licensees the option of either specifying all panel lenders or the six with whom the licensee does the most business.
The second proposed change is to regulations providing mortgage managers with the option not to disclose their margins if the maximum cost and interest rate are published on the credit provider's website. Denovan said the MFAA has suggested that this information should instead be displayed on the mortgage manager's website.
Denovan commented that the amendments are likely to approved in meetings on 14 and 29 September. He indicated that there were also proposed changes to regulations surrounding Key Fact Sheets which would require mortgage managers rather than their credit providers to supply consumers with these documents.
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