FCA fees increase for new applications

An FCA fees increase for applications made by newly authorised firms has been announced. The FCA has also said that it will start charging firms to make staff changes under SMCR.

Currently, the FCA charges firms £1,500 for simple applications, and £5,000 for fairly complex applications. In a consultation paper published November 19^th, the regulator proposes to increase those charges to £2,500 and £10,000 respectively.

The motivation behind the price hike is to “redress the balance of cost recovery towards applicants and away from existing fee-payers”, according to the consultation paper. Critics of the decision say that increasing application fees will act as a barrier to market entry. The FCA illustrate their decision by explaining that processing costs are often higher than the fees they charge.

In a further measure to try and recoup some of those costs, the regulator has also proposed introducing fees for changes in control and applications under SMCR. The FCA explain that “some SMR applications can involve a considerable amount of work, including interviews with key individuals. But on average they take a few hours, so a pricing category 1 charge of £250 would be appropriate.”

Be prepared.

Newly authorised firms need to be made fully aware of the FCA’s expectations around any SMCR changes and their core obligations. Ideagen’s Pentana Compliance is a robust, accountability and competency software that helps financial services firms meet regulatory requirements, raise standards and boost productivity while protecting them and their managers against the risks of non-compliance. By implementing this software solution, FCA regulated firms can:

• Map risk and compliance roles and responsibilities to senior management
• Track senior management’s responsibilities in relation to risk and compliance and automatically validate
• Keep a record of awareness and accountability on individual members of senior management
• Carry out FIT assessments, Competency assessments, ensure records are fully compliant and track renewals

Don’t let the FCA fees increase stifle your ability to become authorised. Find out more about how Ideagen can help you on your journey of maintaining FCA compliance.

Written by

Fraser Doig

As Product Marketing Executive at Ideagen, Fraser is responsible for understanding the needs of our customers and how our software can help them become leaders in their industry. Fraser brings to his role a desire to help organisations drive quality and control in their business processes as a way of achieving operational excellence.