The Financial Service Providers (Registration and Dispute Resolution) Act 2008 (FSP Act) has been amended by the Financial Service Providers (Registration and Dispute Resolution) Amendment Act 2014 (Amendment Act) by repealing the provisions relating to the reserve scheme and also the provisions relating to the levy (which was used to meet part of the costs of the reserve scheme). These provisions came into effect on 1 July 2014 under the Financial Service Providers (Registration and Dispute Resolution) Amendment Act 2014 Commencement Order 2014.

As a consequence of these amendments, the Financial Service Providers (Fees and Levy) Amendment Regulations 2014 have also been enacted to amend the Financial Service Providers (Fees and Levy) Regulations 2010 to remove references to the annual dispute resolution scheme levy. The principal regulations will now relate only to fees payable under the FSP Act and have been renamed the Financial Service Providers (Fees) Regulations 2010.

The Order also brought into effect the provisions in the Amendment Act which:

  • give the Financial Markets Authority new powers to prevent the registration of service providers, or to direct the deregistration of service providers, where registration may create a false or misleading appearance with respect to the extent to which a person provides financial services in New Zealand or is regulated by New Zealand law or where registration may otherwise damage the integrity or reputation of New Zealand's financial markets; and

  • change the requirements relating to the rules about approved dispute resolution schemes.

The Amendment Act has one outstanding provision still to be implemented relating to when a service relating to a credit contract is a financial service (see section 7). It is intended that this section will come into force after a regulation under the FSP Act is made to provide for an exemption relating to securitisation or covered bond arrangements.