The FCA has published a consultation paper regarding consumer credit reporting. The FCA wants to improve the information it collects from firms, so that it can better understand firms’ consumer credit activities and proactively supervise firms to identify and prevent risk of harm to consumers earlier.
This consultation is for firms engaged in the following regulated activities:
- credit broking
- debt adjusting
- debt counselling
- providing credit information services
- advising, representing or providing software to support compliance with regulatory reporting for any of the above firms.
The proposed return will ask firms whether they have been actively undertaking activities and using their Permissions and, if not, asking the reason for this to determine whether firms intend to use their Permissions. This will significantly improve the FCAs ability to proactively identify firms which have incorrect or outdated Permissions on the Financial Services Register. The proposed return will also ask for significant data in relation to business models, numbers, amounts and APRs of agreements, relationships with lenders and other brokers, employees, revenue, sales channels and firms’ remuneration.
The proposals would require a new CCR return to be completed and submitted by 26th February 2027, covering the calendar year of 2026. If the proposals are introduced, impacted firms would need to be able to start gathering and recording the required data by 1st January 2026.
Firms with consumer credit Permissions should take this opportunity to review those Permissions to determine if any of them are not being used and are not likely to be used in the near to medium future. We recommend that firms scrutinise the details of the proposed reporting in the Consultation Paper, and consider responding to the FCA before 31st October 2024.