Speaking today (November 8) at the Personal Finance Society’s annual conference in Birmingham, the technical specialist for the FCA said that firms were “either restricted or independent”, and firms had to define why they were restricted.
Calling for advisory firms to steer clear of describing themselves as “whole of market restricted”, he said they had to explain clearly the definitions of both models to clients.
He added that the regulator would not assume a firm was restricted if it had a large amount of clients on one investment platform. Rather the FCA would be judging whether a firm was restricted or independent “on an individual, case by case basis”.
Mr Percival also said firms had to focus in engaging clients with their literature, rather than just complying with regulations.
He admitted that consumers currently did not want to engage with the “small print”, which could in turn affect them adversely.
He also confirmed that the FCA had started the second stage of reviews into post-RDR advice models and would publish its findings in the new year.
