Flourishing e-money and payments sector in scope for SMCR

The Senior Managers and Certification Regime is poised to cast its net even wider, with proposals to include the UK’s nearly 1,500 e-money and payment services firms. Ben Arram outlines practical implications that affected firms should consider.

Ben Arram is a managing consultant at regulatory specialists Bovill (www.bovill.com) where he gives specialist advice and support to payment services and e-money clients, as well as banking, broking, trading and financial market infrastructure firms.

The SMCR harks back to the financial crisis in 2008 and has the aim of improving standards of conduct for people in the financial services industry in addition to holding them to account for their actions. The regime was first implemented in 2016 and originally applied to the banking sector but, at the end of 2019, it was extended to most solo-regulated financial services firms. In its recent Perimeter Report, the Financial Conduct Authority proposed extending the regime further to include e-money and payment services firms, of which there are nearly 1,500 currently authorised or registered in the United Kingdom.