Advisers must provide the Financial Conduct Authority with evidence of all of the financial advice they gave in 2015, as part of a review by the regulator into advice suitability
The FCA confirmed to FTAdviser it has asked a sample of firms for an ‘advice register’, meaning a record of all personal recommendations made between 1 January 2015 and 31 December 2015.
Firms are to provide the information by 3 May this year, and the FCA will use the data to decide which files the firms will have to provide for suitability checks.
Independent advisers will also be required to hand over data about what percentage of their business is non-pension investments, pension accumulation and retirement income respectively, and information on cases undertaken on an insistent client basis.
Records of IFA firms’ pension transfer advice are also under scrutiny. The FCA has also asked IFAs whether they record rebalancing investments as part of personal recommendations that would fall on the advice register.
Last week, over 700 advice firms were contacted by the Financial Conduct Authority alerting them to its imminent intention to request and review their suitability reports.
The regulator sent letters informing firms it will be reviewing a sample of reports as part of ongoing supervisory work in the intermediary sector.
Businesses were chosen from a “statistically representative sample” of the market, according to the FCA, with about 500 smaller firms having to submit one suitability report, while the remaining larger firms will have to submit two.
ruth.gillbe@ft.com
