21 Jul MPs Urge FSA to Scrutinise Bank Advisers’ Adherence to RDR

MPs have urged the Financial Services Authority (FSA) to ensure that bank advisers' commit to full adherence to the upcoming RDR rules, as they believe that less scrupulous advisers may not follow the regulations as they should. MPs claim that IFAs had raised concerns that firms with provider and distributor arms, such as banks, could cross-subsidise advice costs from product manufacturing. This has led to the committee urging the FSA to conduct annual reviews on bank advisers to check that they adhere to the RDR. The report said "We recommend that the FSA (or its successor the Financial Conduct Authority) report after one year, and then yearly, on the impact of the RDR on vertically integrated firms' remuneration structures, indicating breaches that have been found and what remedies the regulator has asked for. "Only with such transparency will the IFA community be persuadable that it has not been unfairly impacted by the implementation of the RDR."