The board of directors of the Investment Dealers Association has sent the IDA’s proposed complaint reporting system off to securities regulators for approval, although the systems won’t be in place until next year.

Under the new rules, member firms will be required to report statistical and summary information regarding customer complaints to the IDA.

The information must include all securities-related civil claims and arbitration notices, and all judgements, awards, private settlements, arbitrations or other resolutions of any securities-related claim or complaint.

The IDA will decide the amount of detail required in the statistical and summary information, and it will be building a system to collect and analyze this information. “The information will be used by the sales compliance and enforcement areas of the IDA so that they may focus their efforts on high-risk areas within the securities industry.”

The IDA says, “We are currently in the process of developing the specifications of the system to collect and analyze the information collected. The process for developing the specifications will include a review of a similar system in use at NASD Regulation Inc. and consultation with a sample of members. Systems to implement these changes are currently being designed and should be ready in early 2002.”