FSPO Levy Regulations
February 2023The Financial Services and Pensions Ombudsman (‘FSPO’) resolves complaints from consumers, small businesses and other organisations, against financial service providers and pension providers.
On 20th January 2023, the Financial Services and Pensions Ombudsman Act 2017 [Financial Services and Pensions Ombudsman Council] Financial Services Industry Levy Regulations 2023 (‘the Regulations’)were signed (
here).
The Regulations came into operation on 1st February 2023.
The Regulations require that each financial service provider is liable to pay an annual levy in relation to the services provided by the FSPO to the finance industry.
The levy payable by each type of financial service provider for the year ended 31st December 2023 is to be calculated by reference to the criteria in each category under the Schedule to these Regulations.
In order to ensure an equitable distribution of the levy among financial service providers, on an annual basis an exercise is carried out to ensure that the proportion of the levy applicable to each category of financial service provider reflects the volume of complaints received by the FSPO in the previous three-year period.
The Regulations also provide for the collection and recovery of the levy and provide for certain obligations in respect of self-assessment and record keeping by financial service providers.
For more information regarding the levy, the FSPO has issued a helpful guidance which can be found at the following link:
The Financial Services and Pensions Ombudsman Levy Report 2023