AdvisorVault Now Offers Consolidated D3P Service to Help FINRA Firms Achieve SEC Rule 17a-4

New York, NY, December 21, 2014 --(PR.com)-- Small FINRA firms can’t spend thousands of dollars a year trying to keep compliant with SEC rule 17a-4; they must continually find ways to keep this cost low as possible, and one way is to use a Consolidated D3P (Designated Third Party) service.

This unique consolidated D3P service offered by AdvisorVault is priced at one low monthly fee and includes everything needed to achieve all the electronic records archiving requirements of SEC 17a-4 regulation.

This means AdvisorVault does the actual remote data archiving and performs all the other functions as needed by the designated third party downloader provider. By using AdvisorVault, the whole compliance process is simplified, thus, making audits easier to pass with a large reduction in the cost of compliance. Essentially, six key features are included in AdvisorVault's consolidated D3P service:

Six Features of AdvisorVault's Consolidated D3P Service:

1. Email Archiving: Firstly, AdvisorVault will perform the archiving of email. This is important because during the FINRA electronic records request, it is the first thing auditors will want to see as part of the 17a-4 electronic records supervision process.

2. Books and Records Archiving: Once a full email archiving process is in place, FINRA members need to make sure data contained in the books and records is properly archived with the D3P. The key here is to make sure all this data is easily stored in an SEC format compliant with the electronic records archiving rules of SEC 17a-4. In addition, AdvisorVault has offers several features to achieve the ongoing supervisory rules of 17a-4:

- Daily Alerts and Reporting: Compliance officers and key personnel need to receive regular reports of the data archiving process done by the D3P. Reports as well as regular emails showing what data has been archived will form a critical part of the FINRA firms’ supervisory process so it can be proven to regulators during an audit

- Sample Data Sets: Just like email, regulators will ask for a sample data sets contained in the firms Books and records. FINRA firms, such as broker-dealers will be asked to provide a samples of data being archived with the D3P, this should be a simple process that compliance officers perform themselves during an audit

- Secure Consolidated Access: AdvisorVault includes a secure consolidated web interface that compliance officers and other key personnel can use to search as well as download sample data to their computers so they can make copies of this data to DVD which can be given to auditors when requested

3. Disaster Recovery: Since AdvisorVault is performing the backup and archiving of critical systems and other electronic records, they can also perform disaster recovery as required by FINRA firm’s business continuity plan regulation.

4. Electronic Records Supervision: To ensure full compliance with SEC rule 17a-4 FINRA firms must have a tool to perform the ongoing supervision of electronic records, and be able to access their data archive during an audit. Therefore, AdvisorVault includes a secure web interface to compliance officers. In addition, this supervisory tool needs to have automatic indexing built into it so that searches can be done quickly and all data is included to provide full seven year access as required by SEC rule 17a-4 for FINRA electronic records retention compliance.

5. The 17a-4 Third Party Downloader: As part of their service, AdvisorVault can access the FINRA firm’s data archive. In addition, they can download any data in a format readable by auditors. This is critical because archiving data as required by SEC rule 17a-4.

6. Documentation: As our final obligation, AdvisorVault will provide four compliance documents to customers, (1) A Service Level Agreement, (2) the 17a-4 3rd Party Storage Provider Letter, (3) the 17a-4 Broker Dealer Letter and (4) documentation outlining disaster recovery procedures.

Summary:
AdvisorVault's consolidate D3P service is one of the best ways for small FINRA firms to simplify and keep the cost of achieving SEC rule 17a-4 low as possible. However, it’s important that firms understand the key requirements which must be included in the solution because in the end the goal is to pass FINRA audits effectively while avoiding unnecessary fines, therefore maintaining the highest level of customer confidence at all times.

About AdvisorVault:
AdvisorVault is the only remote backup provider that helps small financial firms achieve today’s stringent data compliance requirements surrounding electronic records archiving and supervision. With our designated third-party status (D3P) we help our customers with rules 17a-3 & 17a-4, as well as the supervisory and disaster recovery demands contained in FINRA rules 3510 and 3010. For one flat monthly fee the service includes everything needed to ensure today’s audits are successfully passed.

AdvisorVault Contact:
Allan Lonz, President
alonz@advisorvault.org
www.advisorvault.org
Direct: 416-985-0310
Toll free: 1-866-925-1941 ex 1