Eligibility and pathway to become a Certified Financial Planner

Eligibility and pathway to become a Certified Financial Planner

I am doing BBA from XRLI Jamshedpur. I would like to go for CFPCM Certification Program after completing BBA. What are the requisites for being a Certificate Financial Planner? Please provide me details of its exams and tests.

Certified Financial Planner certification is offered by Financial Planning Standards Board of India (FPSBI). To become a CFPCM Certificate holder, you must pass five exams based on various aspects of personal finance, conducted by the National Stock Exchange (NSE). It requires you to have completed Class 12 with five years of work experience or graduation with three years of work relevant experience.

CFPCM Certification program assessment modules:

• Introduction to Financial Planning
• Risk Analysis & Insurance Planning
• Retirement Planning & Employee Benefits
• Investment Planning
• Tax Planning & Estate Planning
• Advance Financial Planning

While doing graduation you can assist a financial planner in his practice on a part-time basis while pursuing studies or any other job relevant to the field of financial advisory. These are the two pathways for pursuing this program.

Regular Pathway: Appear for all five exams and pass with a minimum of 60% for the first 4 exams and 50% for the last.

Challenge Status Pathway: Appear for the fifth exam and pass with a minimum of 50%. You must have minimum of three years of work experience and a specialised qualification in finance or related subjects.

There is no exam for Module 1. The subject content is entrenched in other exams. All exams are conducted online and are based on an MCQ format. After you clear the first four module exams, your command over individual subjects of personal finance is very well established. You can apply for the title of Associate Financial Planner (AFP) in each of the individual subjects. On clearing the final exam, you will be awarded the CFPCM title, which includes all the AFP titles.