The Mutual Fund Dealers Association of Canada has published for comment proposed changes to its policy regarding dealers’ complaint-handling standards.

Back in July 2007, the B.C. Securities Commission and Ontario Securities Commission published proposed amendments to the relevant policy for a 30-day comment period. The proposed amendments are now being republished for comment due to the comments it received on the original proposal (the first publication received four comments), along with discussions with staff of the Canadian Securities Administrators and the Investment Industry Regulatory Organization of Canada.

IIROC has proposed its own rule regarding dealer complaint-handling, and the CSA will be doing so as part of its registration reform. In May 2008, a working group comprised of CSA, MFDA and IIROC staff was established to develop a complaint handling framework to ensure that the requirements to be adopted by the two self-regulatory organizations and in the registration reform were harmonized.

Among other things, the proposed amendments would reduce the deadline for providing a substantive response to a complaint from six months to three months, “to reflect the current practices of most members in the majority of their complaints and to harmonize the timeframe with the requirements of IIROC and those under consideration by the CSA.”

The MFDA indicates that its complaint handling proposal “is consistent with and meets the same regulatory objectives as the complaint handling framework and IIROC proposal, while being structured differently. This approach has been adopted to ensure that the MFDA proposal conforms to existing MFDA rules and the regulatory obligations to which members are subject and avoids confusion or inconsistent reporting in respect of these existing obligations.”

The latest amendments are out for a 60-day comment period.

Comments should be made in writing prior to May 12.

IE