DSI Certification FAQ

DSI’s procedures are recorded in the Administrative Organisation and Internal Management Measures document. An accountant monitors DSI’s compliance with these procedures and provides a report of his or her findings to both the board and the AFM, as per the terms of the covenant between DSI and AFM.

You can be included in more than one register if you meet certain job profile and admission requirements. An overview of the various DSI registers and their conditions can be found here.

Absolutely. You can request certification as a self-employed professional, temporary worker or contractor, franchisee, or employee of an institution that is affiliated with a DSI participant’s AFM license.

Your diplomas will remain valid for as long as you meet the current requirements for the register in which you were certified. You can also maintain your professional expertise, even if you are no longer DSI-certified, for example by participating in the periodic tests for your certification. Check the DSI website regularly for new information. If you missed the periodic test, you can always take it again later, because the tests are always updated together with the relevant examinations.

DSI only accredits examinations. You are entirely free to choose the best way to prepare for the exams. Ask your employer and/or educational institution which training options are available to you.

The European Securities & Markets Authority (ESMA), the organisation that drafted the ESMA Guidelines, determines who is eligible to serve as a supervisor. Only those employees who possess suitable qualifications and experience, as stipulated in the ESMA Guidelines, may act as supervisors of Candidate Certified Professionals (professionals who do not yet meet all of the Guideline criteria) within an organisation. The employee may not work under supervision for longer than 4 years. For more information, please refer to the ESMA Guidelines and the AFM.

The Financial Markets Authority requires Certified Professionals to have the equivalent of 12 months of relevant fulltime work experience.

Based on this criteria, DSI has drawn up the following requirement for DSI certification:
During a 12-month period (fulltime equivalent) over the past five years, the Certified professional has spent a substantial portion of his/her time on register-related activities, whether in the current position or in previous positions.

That means the required work experience for a part-time position must be proportional to 12 months of fulltime employment.

DSI expects employers to pay close attention to their employees’ work history when hiring new employees. To that end, DSI asks employers to state whether the employee meets the 12-month requirement in writing as part of the Employer’s Statement.

DSI differentiates between three general categories of certifications that professionals can obtain: Retail, Institutional and Specialist.

• DSI Retail: professionals listed in one of the retail registers have contact with non-professional investment clients. They offer advice or information to private clients regarding an investment product, and work at a financial institution or asset management firm.
• DSI Institutional: professionals listed in one of the institutional registers have contact with professional investment clients. They offer advice or information to institutional clients, such as pension funds, regarding an investment product, and work at a financial institution or asset management firm.
• DSI Specialist: professionals who wish to prove that they are up to date about the latest developments and requirements in the field of professional knowledge and expertise may choose to be listed in one of the specialist registers. These specialist professionals include investment analysts, compliance professionals and security brokers.

DSI was founded at the initiative of the financial sector in order to give form to the sector’s self-regulation activities. There is no legal requirement to be affiliated with or certified by DSI. However, financial firms do have a legal obligation to guarantee fair and honest operations. DSI helps in this by promoting and monitoring the expertise and integrity of financial professionals. DSI has signed a covenant with the supervisory body, the Financial Markets Authority (AFM). Many financial firms require their investment specialists to be registered with DSI.

With your DSI certification, you show clients, prospects and the supervisory body that your organisation places a high value on the integrity and expertise of your employees. Moreover, doing so contributes to the legal requirement to guarantee fair and honest operations. It also shows that your fully-certified employees meet the required European ESMA Guidelines, which are enforced by the AF

DSI stands for impartial, serious self-regulation. DSI’s approach is characterised by a system that promotes and certifies the integrity and expertise of financial professionals on one hand, and that also intervenes when necessary on the other.

Every DSI-certified professional has been exhaustively screened, has the relevant education and work experience, has completed the training necessary to deal with integrity-related dilemmas, and is periodically reviewed on their integrity and expertise. Moreover, DSI-certified professionals commit to abide by the Code of Conduct. And when they violate the Code of Conduct, they can be held accountable by ethics enforcement agencies. This ‘closed system’ enables consumers, employers and supervisory bodies to trust that the certified professionals meet the strictest standards placed by the sector.

DSI’s procedures are recorded in the Administrative Organisation and Internal Management Measures document. An accountant monitors DSI’s compliance with these procedures and provides a report of his or her findings to both the board and the AFM, as per the terms of the covenant between DSI and AFM.

When a firm merges or splits, a copy of the notary deed must be sent to DSI.  Your DSI-certified employees can then be registered under the name of the new organisation, as long as it is also affiliated with DSI.

The employees may request certification as a self-employed professional, temporary worker or contractor, franchisee, or employee of an institution that is affiliated with a DSI participant’s AFM license.

This page provides an overview of the general criteria for certification, such as the educational and experience requirements, etc. Our certifications page lists the requirements for each register in greater detail.

This page features our General Regulations and appendix to the General Regulations explaining the minimum requirements and the DSI-accredited examinations.

DSI expects employers to pay close attention to their employees’ work history when hiring new employees. To that end, DSI asks you as an employer to state whether the employee meets the 12-month requirement in writing as part of the Employer’s Statement.

There is no Continuing Professional Education program for the Integrity register at this moment, so the requirement does not apply to you.

No, if you registered with DSI in 2023, then you are not required to complete the Continuing Professional Education program until 2024.

If you have already been registered at DSI in the last two years, you do have the obligation to complete PV 2023. 

You can find a list of accredited education providers in this overview. Several different providers offer accredited Continuing Professional Education programs, so we recommend that you ask your employer if the organisation has made any arrangements with a specific provider. Many DSI participants have made such arrangements, so you may not have to choose a provider on your own.

The Continuing Professional Education objectives differ from register to register. The learning objectives for each register are listed on this page.

If you are registered with DSI before January 1st of the current calendar year, then you are required to complete the Continuing Professional Education program. It is important for you to keep your knowledge up-to-date, even if you have not yet earned all of the required diplomas or certificates.

This requirement does not apply to Candidate Certified Professionals or Certified Professionals listed in the Integrity register.

The deadline for completing the 2021 Continuing Professional Education program is 1 June 2022. If you have not yet started one of the Continuing Professional Education programs, please contact one of the education providers offering the 2021 Continuing Professional Education program to enrol in the programme.

If you have already completed the Continuing Professional Education requirements for 2021, congratulations! You can ignore this e-mail.

Twice each year, the education providers send DSI a list of professionals who have successfully completed the Continuing Professional Education program for that year. DSI received the results for the 2021 programme in January and July 2022. We process these results in the DSI register upon receipt, and when the data are processed we notify the Certified Professionals, even if our data show that a Certified Professional has not yet completed the Continuing Professional Education program for a register.

You do not have to submit the diplomas or certificates or upload any documents to prove that you have completed the study programme. DSI will process the results automatically based on the information we receive from the educational institutions.

We recommend that you contact your education provider. Our website provides an overview of all DSI-accredited education providers.

If a Certified Professional does not successfully complete the programme before 1 July 2022, then their current status in the DSI register will be converted to ‘Candidate Certified Professional’. That means you no longer meet the legal requirements for proving your professional expertise.

We are aware of this problem. The cause may be that you have more than one role, for example because you are the contact person for multiple business units and/or you are both a contact person for your employer and a DSI certified professional.

Fortunately, we can re-set your password for you and/or add your double role to your profile, so that you can switch between your different roles in the future.

If this situation applies to you, please notify your relations manager Nana Asante via n.asante@dsi.nl, with reference to ‘re-set password for certification participant’. Please include the following details in your e-mail:

• Your first and last name
• Your DSI certification registration number, if applicable
• Your company name
• Your job title

We will process your request as quickly as possible, and we will notify you once we have re-set your login details.

There is a new URL for MijnDSI. Instead of trying www.mijndsi.nl, enter www.mijn.dsi.nl for direct access.

We’re sorry to hear that you can’t log in using your current user name and password. Fortunately, we can re-set them for you.

In the login screen, click on ‘I can’t log in’ under ‘User Name and Password’. Enter your e-mail address, and we will send you an e-mail with a link to change your password.

If you do not have a MijnDSI account, you can create one by clicking on ‘I don’t have an account’ in the MijnDSI portal.

The new MijnDSI requires sharp images to correctly verify the authenticity of documents. If you cannot upload your document, try taking a sharper photo of the image and upload it again. Please note: the maximum file size is 5 MB.

Are you still having trouble uploading a document?

If it is for a screening request, please contact our Screening Officers via screening@dsi.nl or call 020-620 12 47.

If it is for a certification request, please contact our Certification Officers via certificering@dsi.nl or call 020-620 12 47.

Unfortunately, MijnDSI is only accessible via a desktop or laptop at the moment. In the future, we will add the option to enter changes in MijnDSI via mobile devices as well. Until then, we ask that you enter any changes via a desktop or laptop.

At the bottom of the screen, you will see the name of your employer. Double-click on this link to view your request.

Don’t see this link? MijnDSI is optimised for the Firefox and Chrome browsers, and does not work as well in Internet Explorer and Microsoft Edge. If you use Internet Explorer or Microsoft Edge, then try logging in via Chrome. This may correct the problems with your account.

If your account is still empty, please contact our helpdesk via info@mijndsi.nl or call 020 620 12 74.

No, that is not necessary. We regularly receive the results of all training providers and automatically update your certification details. So you don’t need to do anything.

Our DSI assistants can manually correct your registration in our back office system. Simply send an e- mail with your request to certificering@dsi.nl, along with the following information:

• Your first and last name
• Your DSI registration number
• Which DSI register you are registered in

We will process your request and send you a reply as quickly as possible. Please note that the waiting time might be a bit longer than you are accustomed to.

Some certifications are not correctly displayed in the new MijnDSI environment at the moment. We are aware of this problem, and are hard at work on a solution. Once we have solved the problem in the Public Register, we will post a notification on this page.

If the matter is urgent, and you need an answer within one working week, then the DSI assistants can manually correct your registration in our back office system.

Simply send an e-mail with your request to certificering@dsi.nl, along with the following information:

• Your first and last name
• Your DSI registration number
• Which DSI register you are registered in

We will process your request and send you a reply as quickly as possible. Please note that the waiting time might be a bit longer than you are accustomed to.

Our DSI assistants can manually correct your registration in our back office system. Simply send an e- mail with your request to certificering@dsi.nl, along with the following information:

• Your first and last name
• Your DSI registration number
• Which DSI register you are registered in

We will process your request and send you a reply as quickly as possible.

Some certifications are not correctly displayed in the new MijnDSI environment at the moment. We are aware of this problem, and are hard at work on a solution. Once we have solved the problem in the Public Register, we will post a notification on this page.

If the matter is urgent, and you need an answer within one working week, then the DSI assistants can manually correct your registration in our back office system.

Simply send an e-mail with your request to certificering@dsi.nl, along with the following information:

• Your first and last name
• Your DSI registration number
• Which DSI register you are registered in

We will process your request and send you a reply as quickly as possible. Please note that the waiting time might be a bit longer than you are accustomed to.