The Financial Conduct Authority has appointed Therese Chambers and Steve Smart as joint executive directors of enforcement and market oversight in a move to strengthen its enforcement team.  The watchdog says the bigger enforcement team will help ensure consumer outcomes meet the higher standards of the new Consumer Duty which arrives in July. The FCA […]

The number of complaints about life and pension or investment companies fell by 8% during 2022, according to the latest data from the Financial Ombudsman Service. But complaints about banking, insurance and mortgages were up as much as 14%. Data published by FOS today covered complaints data about individual businesses for the six months from […]

Therese Chambers, director of consumer investments at the FCA, has revealed more details of the advice/guidance review, including the fact it will be a joint enterprise between the FCA and the Treasury. She shared the information during a speech at the TISA Financial Advice and Guidance Conference. She said the review will cover both the […]

  Harry Katz, a retired Certified Financial Planner with more than 40 years experience in financial services, takes a sceptical look at recent concerns that HNW clients are facing a major problem due to rapidly rising Inheritance Tax (IHT) bills. In recent times we’ve all seen the many reports about rapidly rising IHT bills, with […]

This year’s Budget has baffled me more than most. I still cannot get my head around why a seemingly highly conservative Chancellor Jeremy Hunt threw out a decade of pensions taxation policy and effectively said “to hell with it.” Scrapping the LTA, and significantly increasing other pensions saving allowances such as the Annual Allowance by […]