MorganAsh comments as Consumer Duty comes into force today

31 July 2023

As the FCA’s Consumer Duty regulation comes into force today (31st July 2023), we have a comment from Consumer Duty specialists, MorganAsh.

MorganAsh has developed the MorganAsh Resilience System (MARS) to help brokers, advisers and financial services firms better manage and evaluate consumer vulnerability and comply with Consumer Duty.

Andrew Gething, managing director of MorganAsh said: “After much preparation and much talk, it’s fantastic to see Consumer Duty finally come into force. There’s no question it will be a transformative piece of regulation, helping level-up all areas of the industry to eliminate foreseeable harm and ensure good outcomes for customers – especially for those with vulnerable characteristics.

“The FCA’s latest Financial Lives survey has demonstrated just how important this regulation is with 52 percent of UK adults (27.3m people) classed as financially vulnerable. Without a consistent approach to identify, monitor and evidence vulnerability, it will be impossible for firms to ensure they are delivering good outcomes or meeting the new rules.

“Complacency has long been a challenge for Consumer Duty, with firms believing they already meet its requirements. In reality, the new rules expand the scope of vulnerabilities firms must now consider and the actions they must take. It also expands the monitoring requirement considerably to cover the lifetime of the product.

“Technology is proving essential in meeting its requirements, not just for a consistent and objective way to assess vulnerability, but to mitigate the considerable training overhead of learning all the necessary characteristics of vulnerability and the myriad of treatments available to clients. While there may be firms still with work to do and attitudes still to change, those that have embraced Consumer Duty are already understanding the competitive advantage it can provide.”