Extension of the Senior Managers and Certification Regime (SM&CR) Implementation Periods for Solo-Regulated Firms

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) announced on June 30, 2020 that the Treasury has agreed to delay the deadline for solo-regulated firms to undertake the first assessment of the fitness and propriety of their Certified Persons. The deadline has been delayed from December 9, 2020 until March 31, 2021 to provide firms significantly affected by the coronavirus pandemic time to make any changes needed.

To ensure SM&CR deadlines remain consistent, the FCA also intends to consult on extending other deadlines from December 9, 2020 to March 31, 2021 for the following requirements:

• The date that the Conduct Rules come into force for staff who are not Senior Managers or Certified Persons
• The date that Conduct Rules training is delivered for relevant employees
• The deadline for submitting information about Directory Persons to the Register
• Reference in the rules to the deadline for assessing Certified Persons as fit and proper

Conduct Rules Training

Senior Managers must ensure that Conduct Rules training is effective and that staff understand how the rules apply to them in their jobs. Therefore preparation, time and effort will be needed to effectively deliver training. Firms should, where possible, still deliver Conduct Rule training before March 31, 2021 as planned. The FCA will provide more details about its expectations on Conduct Rule training.

Certification of Staff

Firms should continue their work to assess certified staff as fit and proper and where possible, certify staff earlier than March 31, 2021. Where staff are not fit and proper, firms should not wait to remove them from their certified roles.

The Directory

Firms should provide information to the FCA on Directory Persons before March 31, 2021 if possible. The FCA will still publish details of certified staff of solo regulated firms from December 9, 2020 on the Financial Services Register.

Read the full FCA statement here.