HM Treasury has released a Policy Statement on the Appointed Representatives Regime.
Pleasingly, the opening paragraph is very much supportive of the Appointed Representatives Regime:
“The government views the Appointed Representatives (AR) regime as playing an important part in the provision of UK financial services, delivering a range of benefits to businesses and consumers. The regime provides a proportionate and cost-effective way for firms to engage in regulated activity without being authorised, allowing a broader range of providers to enter the marketplace. In doing so, the AR regime promotes competition, supports innovation and contributes to economic growth.”
The original consultation and Call for Evidence leading up to this was issued in December 2021, nearly 4 years ago, and 4 Prime Ministers ago! The world was different back then and at that time there was the scandal over the collapse of Greensill Capital and lobbying during the Covid pandemic by their adviser and former Prime Minister David Cameron. The only part of Greensill that was regulated was an AR, hence the outcry then.
Alongside this, the FCA issued its own rules to strengthen the expectations of principal firms’ oversight of ARs, including ensuring they have adequate systems, controls and resources in place. These came into force in December 2022 and are now well established, such as more granular reporting to the FCA by principals of the activities of their ARs, such as income and complaints by individual ARs.
Within the HM Treasury Policy Statement there are 2 recommendations.
Firstly, going forward, firms wishing to appoint ARs will have to apply to the FCA for newly created regulatory permission of acting as a principal and will be subject to greater scrutiny by the FCA before they are allowed to take on any ARs. Existing principal firms, such as ITC, will not have to apply for this permission.
Secondly, going forward, the Financial Ombudsman Service (“FOS”) will be able to directly investigate any complaint involving regulated activities carried on by an AR outside the scope of its contract with its principal firm. This is likely to be relatively few cases and there is also a wider review into the role of FOS which this proposal will have to be consistent with.
Although we have waited a long time for this announcement from HM Treasury, it is an endorsement of the current regulatory framework regarding ARs that only relatively minor changes are being proposed. ITC has already enacted into its processes the FCA rules that came into force in 2022 and so you can be confident that as an AR of ITC you are on a secure regulatory footing.
Watch this space!