The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has published its main areas of focus on Consumer Duty for the upcoming year. There are four focus areas in total, and these are;
Embedding the Duty and raising standards
Within this section, there are three main project areas to help the FCA identify good practices, areas for improvement, and ways to mitigate poor practices.
- Review Board/Governance reports and complaints root cause analysis
- Review the treatment of consumers in vulnerable circumstances
- Review customer support outcomes and support consumers in informed decision-making
Enhancing understanding of price and value
The FCA acknowledges that firms have found conducting fair value assessments challenging and have also raised questions around the expectations of the regulator, the FCA will ensure that firms are supporting where needed, this will include focusing on:
- Platform cash – treatment of interest on cash balances
- Market study into pure protection insurance
- Unit-linked pension and long-term savings
- Market studies into premium finance
Sector-specific finance
The FCA has planned work to tackle areas of concern throughout different sectors within financial services. For firms working in Consumer Finance, the main area of focus for the FCA will be digital journeys and assessing whether a firm's digital tools and processes help and support customers in their understanding.
Releasing the benefits of Consumer Duty
Finally, the FCA published a ‘call for input’ covering wider requirements on retail firms and asking firms to help identify where the Duty can be used to simplify current rules and guidance. The deadline for responses was October 2024. The results will be published in the first half of 2025.
If you need any support with embedding Consumer Duty within your firm, with root cause analysis, monitoring management information, or any other elements of regulation, then please get in touch.