AFCA reveals appointments for newly-created senior ombudsman role

The senior ombudsman will work alongside the group’s lead ombudsman in advice and investments, banking and finance, insurance, and superannuation.

The new appointments, all internal promotions, include Shail Singh (advice and investments), Brenda Staggs (financial difficulty), Anne Maree Howley (superannuation), Chris Liamos (general insurance), Andrew Weinmann (life insurance), Louise McAuliffe (credit) and Neva Skilton (transactions).

“They’ll bring their specialist technical and professional expertise to bear on projects aimed at efficient and consistent decision making, which we know is important to both complainants and financial firms,” deputy chief ombudsman June Smith said.

“The senior ombudsman will help ensure we deliver an independent, fair and consistent approach to decision making and complaint resolution.”

The new appointments already have a number of projects lined up, including developing new and revised AFCA approaches with stakeholders.

It comes after the financial services ombudsman last week committed to providing providing clarity on a particular area in the forthcoming compensation scheme of last resort (CSLR) legislation.

With the legislation set to be debated in Parliament in the coming weeks, the financial services ombudsman has acknowledged that the current proposed CSLR treats complaints about losses from a sale, distribution and operation of managed investment schemes and financial products, and the provision of financial advice differently, and said it intends to provide clarification for the advice sector.

Neil Griffiths

Neil is the Deputy Editor of the wealth titles, including ifa and InvestorDaily.

Neil is also the host of the ifa show podcast.