Reduce time for small businesses in understanding their key regulatory obligations by up to 15 - 25% through compliance assistance initiatives
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Compliance assistance
Consumer Affairs Victoria’s (CAV) Compliance Assistance Site Visits Program provides practical advice to businesses (mostly small businesses) on how to improve compliance with the law. In addition, where minor or technical breaches of the law are identified, the aim will be to provide businesses with the information and advice they need to bring their conduct, processes or record keeping into compliance.
Small businesses often do not have the expertise in-house to fully understand their regulatory obligations. By providing compliance assistance for small businesses, CAV anticipates this free service would save traders time in getting up to speed unaided. For example, it may be the case that 1 hour with CAV compliance experts might save a sole trader 2 to 3 hours of learning time unaided, or time spent seeking advice or attending general seminars.
Compliance assistance site visits would normally follow and support industry-wide education (see Trader Education below) and feed into inspection and enforcement actions concerning high risk traders.
Compliance assistance site visits will be targeted at the following sectors: retailers, real estate agents (including property management), conveyancers, motor car traders, travel agents, second-hand dealers and pawnbrokers, funeral directors, retirement village operators, and residential park operators.
Trader education
CAV has innovated targeted and high impact means of educating and supporting businesses to easily understand their responsibilities and be compliant. For example, this includes trader education resources as part of the:
- Small Business Program (helpline, dedicated website landing page)
- Product Safety Guide for Businesses (multi-lingual guidebook).
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Reduce time costs of compliance inspections for individual traders subject to cross jurisdictional compliance monitoring by 25% through conducting integrated compliance and joint inspections with other regulators (Victorian, state and national) in co-regulated areas where appropriate
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CAV shares regulatory responsibility with national and other Victorian state regulators in certain sectors. CAV has and will continue to increase coordination efforts with other regulators to reduce the impact on traders having to deal with multiple regulators.
Proposed areas include:
- rooming houses (with local councils)
- product safety (with Customs)
- sex work (with local councils, Department of Immigration & Citizenship and Victoria Police)
- fair trading (with Australian Competition and Consumer Commission and other state regulators)
- licensed motor car trader inspections with New South Wales Fair Trading.
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