Introduction

In November 2011, Ontario’s Office of the Fairness Commissioner assessed the way the Certified General Accountants of Ontario registers people who apply for a licence to practise in Ontario, to ensure that the registration practices are fair and continue to improve.  

This summary of the assessment includes commendable practices that are under way and recommendations for improvement.

The Certified General Accountants of Ontario is subject to Ontario's fair access law, the Fair Access to Regulated Professions Act, 2006 (FARPA). The law spells out CGA Ontario's obligation to have transparent, objective, impartial and fair registration methods and requirements.

The Office of the Fairness Commissioner

To encourage accountability under the fair access law, the Office of the Fairness Commissioner (OFC) works with professions’ regulatory bodies to improve the way they register people who apply for professional licences. As a result of the OFC’s work, qualified people, no matter where they were originally trained, will have faster, fairer access to their licence to practise here.

In its work with regulators so far, the OFC has found that they have succeeded in streamlining their registration processes, but they need to do more. For example, regulators need to be more transparent and hold their assessment agencies more accountable for fairness.

To encourage, and hold regulators accountable for, continuous improvement, the OFC assesses their licensing practices in a two-year cycle. This cycle includes recommending improvements where needed and monitoring the bodies’ action plans that address the OFC’s concerns. This approach benefits applicants, the professions and the province.

You can read more about the OFC’s strategy for continuous improvement and its guide for assessments elsewhere on this site.

For more information about this particular assessment, contact the OFC.

Note: The words license, register and certify all refer to authorizing a person to practise a profession.

Commendable Practices

The Certified General Accountants of Ontario (CGA Ontario) is demonstrating many commendable practices, in the following areas. (These areas correspond to the sections of the assessment guide, and are derived from the fair access legislation.)

Information for Applicants

• CGA Ontario enables its potential students or applicants to start the assessment process while they are still outside Canada.
• Information about enrolling in CGA Ontario's Program of Professional Studies is available to applicants in a variety of formats.

Timely Decisions, Responses and Reasons

• CGA Ontario reduced the average time it needs for assessing applications for transfer credits from 20 to 5 business days.
• To improve and accelerate its qualifications assessment and admission processes, CGA Ontario now communicates with applicants more often, keeping them informed about the status of their files (e.g., informing them when CGA Ontario receives their documents) and helping them to identify steps they need to take in order to enter the CGA program.
• The academic credentials review panel increased the frequency of its meetings from monthly to bi-weekly, to improve the timeliness of its assessment decisions.

Assessment of Qualifications

• CGA Ontario adopted a new scoring model for its certification exams. Under the new model, a report of the exam results summarizes a student's level of achievement in the various competencies (the skills and knowledge needed to practise the profession). This helps students to identify any gaps in their required skills and knowledge.
• In 2010, CGA Ontario began developing formal agreements with qualifications assessment agencies. These agreements define the agencies' service standards and hold the agencies accountable for providing qualifications assessments that are transparent, objective, impartial and fair.
• In September 2011, CGA Ontario launched a new work-experience reporting system that provides greater clarity about the competencies needed for certification. CGA Ontario also developed new supporting materials and instructions to help applicants use this new system.

Fairness

• CGA Ontario introduced a new, instructor-led format for online course delivery. This format provides students with weekly, after-hours lecture support through interactive, online discussions with the instructor. This added assistance better serves students who cannot physically attend onsite lectures because they live too far away.
• In 2010, CGA Ontario made arrangements and provided resources for students with special needs. For example, CGA Ontario:
  • changed its course materials to make them compatible with students' visual-aid software
  • provided closed-captioning for interactive, online instructor-led sessions for students with a hearing impairment
• CGA Ontario has Mutual Recognition Agreements (MRAs) with some professional accounting organizations outside of Canada. As a result, applicants who are members of these other organizations may qualify for additional transfer credits and/or direct entry into membership if they meet specified criteria listed in the agreements.
• Students may participate in the CGA Program of Professional Studies while working full time. They can count this experience towards the requirement for work experience.

Recommendations

The OFC recommends improvements in the following areas. (These areas correspond to the sections of the assessment guide, and are derived from the fair access legislation. Recommendations marked "Required" correspond to the practices regulators must demonstrate in order to meet the specific duties in the legislation. Recommendations marked "Good" correspond to the practices the OFC encourages a regulatory body to adopt in order to meet the general duty to provide registration practices that are transparent, objective, impartial and fair.)

Information for Applicants	Status
Make the following changes to the registration information on the CGA Ontario website:
Clearly explain what applicants must do in order to demonstrate good character. [Good]
Tell applicants that, while in rare circumstances CGA Ontario may require credential assessments from qualifications assessment organizations, applicants should first submit their academic credentials to CGA Ontario. CGA Ontario will review the documents, and after reviewing them will ask for an assessment by a qualifications assessment agency only if necessary. [Good]	February 2012
Explain to applicants that they are responsible for fees charged by qualifications assessment agencies. [Good]	February 2012
Documentation of Qualifications
Consider developing one or more documentation checklists to help applicants to better understand which documents they need to submit and how to submit them. [Required]
Update the website to include references to acceptable qualifications assessment agencies. [Good]	February 2012
Training
Provide staff and committee members with training that:
addresses special considerations that may apply in the assessment of applicants, and explains the process for applying those considerations [Good]	December 2011
covers anti-discrimination and cultural diversity [Good]	December 2011
explains the objectives of FARPA to staff and committee members [Good]
Transparency
To clarify the process for assessment of qualifications, consider explaining in detail, on the website, how CGA Ontario determines an applicant's level of education or establishes whether an international degree is comparable or equivalent to a Canadian degree. [Good]	February 2012

Blank = Implementation is in progress.
= Recommendation is implemented.
Acceptable alternative = Regulator implements acceptable alternative to this recommendation.