Bullying and harassment top non-financial misconduct complaints

Research by the regulator has highlighted a seeming increase in reporting of poor behaviour, yet offenders rarely receive severe consequences such as pay adjustments, dismissal or mention in a regulatory reference. Denis O'Connor dissects the data.

Denis O'Connor is a fellow of both the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England & Wales and the Chartered Institute of Securities and Investment. He was a member of the British Bankers' Association Money Laundering Committee from 2003-10 and a member of the Joint Money Laundering Steering Group's board and editorial panel between 2010 and 2016. He has been a frequent speaker at industry conferences on financial crime issues, both in the United Kingdom and abroad.

The Financial Conduct Authority recently published the results of a survey of 1,028 firms in the investment banking, institutional broking and wholesale insurance sectors, which showed that non-financial misconduct (NFMC) allegations rose by 72 per cent between 2021 and 2023. [1] The survey revealed that over the three-year period, allegations of bullying and harassment rose by 26 per cent, while discrimination complaints rose by 23 per cent and 'other' types of NFMC rose by 41 per cent. Interpretation of the findings is difficult as they may represent a genuine increase in the number of incidents and/or the results could be due to the 'victims' having more confidence in their firms' reporting and disciplinary systems without any underlying upturn in incidents.