FCA published a review of consolidation in the financial advice market on Halloween afternoon.
The timing was not coincidental. FCA are known to be obsessed by dates and timings, usually sending out enforcement letters on a Friday at 5pm, and reserving the real nasties until Friday of a bank holiday.
We can all read what is in the paper. But few analyse what was not said. For instance there was no mention of file checking. We say too granular and specific. They expect you to do this anyway, (“embedded.”) FCA spend more time questioning company structure. Process and structure, words each repeated ten times, more than any other word, beating the next best, frameworks, controls and systems, with eight mentions apiece.
What does this tell us? That FCA are looking for ways for you to verify and prove your activity. They want a system. No rocket science in that comment, but where are you going to find one?
BAT has a mission to turn compliance from a burden into a business advantage. It is a single dedicated compliance dashboard built for networks and larger IFAs to manage group compliance.