A skilled person reports

Section 166 reports have been a sore issue for many financial services firms in recent years, but are now a fairly routine aspect of post-crisis UK regulation. Fiona Fry and Karen Bloomfield of KPMG advise on the process from the reviewer’s point of view.

Fiona Fry (fiona.fry@kpmg.co.uk) is a partner and head of regulatory risk consulting, while Karen Bloomfield (karen.bloomfield@kpmg.co.uk) is a director, regulatory risk consulting, at KPMG. Fiona has extensive experience as a skilled person and Karen in leading delivery of reviews.

Over the past few years, the FSA has increasingly used skilled persons as part of its supervisory toolbox, to help it investigate events or to gain clarity about potential concerns over a particular part of the business within a firm. There has been a significant increase in the number of s166 reports commissioned and we expect this trend to continue beyond the split of the FSA into the PRA and the FCA.