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The Financial Conduct Authority’s Unauthorised Business Department has approached BIBA seeking assistance in discharging its duties, in particular its remit to protect consumers and authorised firms from firms/individuals operating without authorisation in breach of the provisions of the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 and other relevant legislation.
The FCA took over regulation of consumer credit from the Office of Fair Trading on 1 April 2014. It has since come to the regulator’s attention that legitimate firms may be aware of unauthorised consumer credit business being undertaken but may not be aware of how to report their concerns to it.
The UBD has requested that BIBA highlights to our members the importance of reporting unauthorised consumer credit business should they come across it. BIBA members wishing to report unauthorised consumer credit businesses to the FCA can do this by sending their reports to firm.queries@fca.org.uk or by using the regulator’s online reporting form. Alternatively members can report their concerns to the compliance team here at BIBA and we will make an anonymised report on your behalf.
Members can check whether a firm is registered by searching the Financial Services Register at: https://register.fca.org.uk
Please be aware that the FCA does not generally give any feedback about how it follows up the information that is reported to it. This is because the legislation under which the FCA operates imposes restrictions on how the regulator can deal with confidential information received. In addition, were the regulator to tell informants about an ongoing investigation it might prejudice the investigation itself.
The FCA said that it realised that this approach can be frustrating but wanted to reassure BIBA members that all information is carefully considered before it decides what action, if any, to take. For further explanation as to the FCA’s policy and the restrictions on releasing confidential information, please refer to the webpage at: http://www.fca.org.uk/site-info/information/information-we-can-share.
BIBA members’ compliance and regulation queries should be directed to: compliance@biba.org.uk
The post Reporting unauthorised consumer credit businesses to the FCA appeared first on British Insurance Brokers' Association.
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