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As my FSA fees soar by 20%, just what has the regulator done for IFAs?
Ihave received notification from my network of the regulatory fees for 2005-06 and surprise, surprise, the fees have gone up by a whopping 20 per cent on last year.
What am I getting for my fees? I looked at the FSA website and apparently it has four statutory objectives - market confidence, public awareness, consumer protection and reduction of financial crime.
It is maintaining confidence in other financial systems but it has not increased confidence in the life and pension industry. It could be argued that part of the reduced confidence is equally down to the actions over the years of financial advisers through such debacles as pension mis-selling, the FSAVC review, precipice bonds, endowment misselling. I accept this point but the FSA has a statutory duty first to sort out the advisers responsible and second, promote confidence in the advisers it sets regulations for. It has yet to start doing this second part. We IFAs are all tarred with the same brush. The public are not saving enough because of a lack...