FINC19016 - Retirement and Superannuation

General Information

Unit Synopsis

This unit covers the regulatory framework of superannuation and the role of financial advisor in retirement and superannuation planning. You will examine the legal and taxation issues related to long term wealth creation and the operation of superannuation funds. You will apply the skills required for managing the client relationship and construct a strategic retirement plan for a client situation.

Details

Level Undergraduate
Unit Level 2
Credit Points 6
Student Contribution Band SCA Band 4
Fraction of Full-Time Student Load 0.125
Pre-requisites or Co-requisites

Pre-requisite: FINC11001 plus Co-requisite: LAWS19033

Important note: Students enrolled in a subsequent unit who failed their pre-requisite unit, should drop the subsequent unit before the census date or within 10 working days of Fail grade notification. Students who do not drop the unit in this timeframe cannot later drop the unit without academic and financial liability. See details in the Assessment Policy and Procedure (Higher Education Coursework).

Class Timetable View Unit Timetable
Residential School No Residential School

Unit Availabilities from Term 2 - 2025

Term 1 - 2026 Profile
Online

Attendance Requirements

All on-campus students are expected to attend scheduled classes - in some units, these classes are identified as a mandatory (pass/fail) component and attendance is compulsory. International students, on a student visa, must maintain a full time study load and meet both attendance and academic progress requirements in each study period (satisfactory attendance for International students is defined as maintaining at least an 80% attendance record).

Assessment Overview

Recommended Student Time Commitment

Each 6-credit Undergraduate unit at CQUniversity requires an overall time commitment of an average of 12.5 hours of study per week, making a total of 150 hours for the unit.

Assessment Tasks

Assessment Task Weighting
1. Practical Assessment 50%
2. Take Home Exam 50%

This is a graded unit: your overall grade will be calculated from the marks or grades for each assessment task, based on the relative weightings shown in the table above. You must obtain an overall mark for the unit of at least 50%, or an overall grade of ‘pass’ in order to pass the unit. If any ‘pass/fail’ tasks are shown in the table above they must also be completed successfully (‘pass’ grade). You must also meet any minimum mark requirements specified for a particular assessment task, as detailed in the ‘assessment task’ section (note that in some instances, the minimum mark for a task may be greater than 50%).

Consult the University's Grades and Results Policy for more details of interim results and final grades

Past Exams

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Previous Feedback

Term 1 - 2024 : The overall satisfaction for students in the last offering of this course was 66.67% (`Agree` and `Strongly Agree` responses), based on a 32.14% response rate.

Feedback, Recommendations and Responses

Every unit is reviewed for enhancement each year. At the most recent review, the following staff and student feedback items were identified and recommendations were made.

Source: Student Evaluation
Feedback
The learning materials are an amazing resource, all the other links make it an overwhelming experience each week. I know that we need to be able to find this information as it changes constantly, it would have been good to go through some of the more important ones during workshops.
Recommendation
Encourage the lecturer to work through the various resources during the Workshop as students are not asking for this assistance during the term.
Action Taken
Lecturer would work through the tile and the expectations of content to cover each week at the start of the weekly workshop
Source: Student Evaluation
Feedback
For someone who works full time, there is too much content and expectations that they have a free 12 hours per week to complete the weekly content as well as an assignment
Recommendation
Try and set the students' expectations around the 12 hour time commitment each week required of students to get through the content.
Action Taken
Explanations in Moodle, specifically the Introduction to the unit, a suggested study schedule in each weekly study guide, and weekly milestones has been implemented
Source: Student
Feedback
"I found I got lost in the information, too much for the 12 hour allocation. If I had to do this again I would chose to do this subject by itself if I could do it again. " "Wasn't a huge fan of having to do another SoA using the same template as the one I did a couple years ago but thats just how it goes I guess" "There was so much information that we must understand the unit's content. There were some minor errors with links to documents, articles, etc. however, these were resolved within a day once identified. The Q&A and communication between students and unit co-ordinator really helped - especially with Midwinter. For this, I am thankful. Midwinter - what can I say? This was one challenging program to use. An in-depth instruction manual is required to be developed by the Midwinter team, including a troubleshooting guide. The limited information available in the help centre was mildly adequate. I struggled using Midwinter and preferred XPlan when I used it in a previous unit. I know the cost of it made it not feasible for the unit, but so many improvements are necessary. "It seems that if the lectures/videos etc are not watched until the very end (i.e a couple minutes), it may not show that they've been watched at all? "From a student who gets up very early to study before her children wake and keep up with the study requirements, the assumption that a stressed student is not putting in the effort/time required was a little unfair" "The learning materials are an amazing resource, all the other links make it an overwhelming experience each week. I know that we need to be able to find this information as it changes constantly, it would have been good to go through some of the more important ones during workshops."
Recommendation
Based on the student evaluation feedback, the content, assessment and having to learn a module or two of Midwinter is too overwhelming. The unit coordinator will simplify the content further, so it meets the Keep it Simple Stupid (KISS) principle.
Action Taken
The unit coordinator has included simpler explanations in the Workbooks and provided additional help through recordings on using Midwinter. However, students need to understand that Midwinter, like any software, has limitations. To truly learn how to use it, students must actively experiment with it themselves, as no number of tutorials can replace hands-on experience
Source: Student evaluation
Feedback
Students felt the amount of work required to complete a financial plan was too much
Recommendation
Continue to set student expectations that they are required to spend the 12 hours per week on the unit and that the unit 's workload is set by TEQSA and the Financial Adviser accreditation body
Action Taken
In Progress
Source: Student evaluation
Feedback
Student requested an extra amount of time for the overall exam given the expectation of referencing
Recommendation
Reduce the number of exam questions to 8 questions, to allow for more time to reference the exam answers
Action Taken
In Progress
Source: Self-reflection
Feedback
Students are dissatisfied with the Unit coordinator developed content that comes from several different resources and references.
Recommendation
Returning to textbooks will give them more content structure, and detail in one resource, rather than expecting them to access several different resources or sources of knowledge and information to learn from. Textbooks also comes with additional benefits like:  Chapter lists Learning objectives for each chapter Key chapter concepts Personal financial scenarios Questions and knowledge applications Concepts checks Key terms Summary Solutions Artwork from the text Worksheets Extension activities References
Action Taken
In Progress
Unit learning Outcomes

On successful completion of this unit, you will be able to:

  1. Explain contemporary retirement and superannuation issues
  2. Apply taxation and legal principles to long term wealth creation
  3. Explain issues relating to self-managed superannuation funds
  4. Construct pre and post strategic retirement plans.

The Financial Advisers Standards and Ethics Authority (FASEA) has accreditted this unit as part of the following courses:

  • Bachelor of Accounting (Financial Planning)
  • Bachelor of Accounting/Bachelor of Business (Financial Planning)
  • Bachelor of Property (Financial Planning)
  • Bachelor of Arts/Bachelor of Business
  • LLB/Bachelor of Business (Financial Planning).

FASEA ceased operations on 31 December 2021. From 1 January 2022 Treasury and the Australian Securities and Investment Commission (ASIC) took over the role of :

  • Adviser education standards including assessment of foreign qualifications and higher education providers
  • Approved courses
  • Other standards.

This unit contributes to the core knowledge field of the accredited courses listed above. The learning otucomes for the unit and the assessments have been designed around the accreditation requirements.

Alignment of Assessment Tasks to Learning Outcomes
Assessment Tasks Learning Outcomes
1 2 3 4
1 - Practical Assessment • • • •
2 - Take Home Exam • • •
Alignment of Graduate Attributes to Learning Outcomes
• Introductory Level
• Intermediate Level
• Graduate Level
Graduate Attributes Learning Outcomes
1 2 3 4
1 - Communication • • • •
2 - Problem Solving • • • •
3 - Critical Thinking • • • •
4 - Information Literacy • • • •
5 - Team Work • • •
6 - Information Technology Competence • • • •
7 - Cross Cultural Competence •
8 - Ethical practice • • • •
9 - Social Innovation •
10 - Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Cultures •
Alignment of Assessment Tasks to Graduate Attributes
• Introductory Level
• Intermediate Level
• Graduate Level
Assessment Tasks Graduate Attributes
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10