The Financial Conduct Authority (“FCA”) will be taking over the regulation of certain claims management activities from the Claims Management Regulator on 1^st April 2019. As such, firms that are impacted by this change must determine if they need to apply for FCA authorisation if they wish to continue to undertake those activities that will be regulated by the FCA.

Here at Complyport we have considerable expertise and experience in FCA regulation and authorisation applications, and we have developed a self-assessment tool that will help firms to establish if they need to apply for authorisation from the FCA. This tool can be accessed by clicking the button below:

All claims management firms, who are currently undertaking what will be regulated claims management activities, must firstly register with the FCA for temporary permission before 31^st March 2019 or risk being unable to continue these activities on 1^st April. Once registered for the temporary permission, the FCA will advise the firm of their window for submission of their authorisation application (this will be either 1^st April to 31^st May 2019 or 1^st June to 31^st July 2019).

Firms who do not apply for temporary permission or who submit applications for authorisation outside of the initial windows can only undertake regulated claims management activities once the FCA has granted authorisation for them to do so. After 1^st April 2019 undertaking regulated claims management activities without either an appropriate temporary permission or full FCA authorisation will be a criminal offence.

It is therefore vitally important that appropriate steps are taken to ensure that the application is submitted on time and to the required standard.

If you would like to discuss how we can assist your firm, please complete our self-assessment tool or contact us and we will be delighted to help you.