FCA increases authorisation application fees
The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) is introducing new fees for firms to pay when applying for authorisation.
The City watchdog said its authorisation application fees haven’t changed for 20 years and has meant regulated firms have effectively subsidised the processing cost.
The regulator identified and reviewed 80 separate changes for authorisation applications and combined them into 10 categories while also increasing them by the rate of inflation.
It means that 49 charges increased, 23 stayed the same and 11 were reduced.
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From 24 January, the amount a firm pays when applying for authorisation will depend on how they fit into one of 10 regulatory categories.
Fees start at £250 in category one, which includes firms applying to be buy-to-let consumer lenders.
Consumer credit firms, which is the regulatory definition a lot of peer-to-peer lenders fall under, are in category three which charges £1,000.
The highest fee is in category 10 at £200,000 for investment exchanges applying for authorisation.
“We believe that the overall impact of our proposals would raise the contribution of applicants towards the cost of processing their applications from about a third to about two-thirds,” the FCA said.
“We consider this a fairer apportionment in principle, though there would not be a large practical impact on existing fee-payers.”
It comes as the FCA proposed a hike in fees from £1,151 to £2,200 for all regulated firms to help fund its supervision activities.
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