The Financial Conduct Authority has issued an initial wave of notices to non-compliant dealers stopping them from selling motor finance.
The five are the first to be named under the new FCA regulations for “failing to be open and co-operative in the consumer credit sector.
iVendi CEO James Tew has warned that they could be the first of many and said: “To some extent, we have been in a holding pattern since the new FCA consumer credit regime came into effect but, with this first wave of motor dealer notices, we are very much seeing the regulator get down to business.
“Issuing five in a short period of time is, compared to the old system of regulation, actually quite a high number and could be a signal of intent. We believe the FCA is possibly setting out its stall and these could be the first of many.”
James said that news about the notices should serve as a warning to dealers that they have no choice but to ensure their motor finance procedures are compliant.
“Even at this stage, we are coming across dealers pretty regularly who have not really got their head around all the implications of providing customers with meaningful choice, accurate information and consistency across their organisation.
“We have been identifying these as part of the work we are doing to use the iVendi Platform to help with FCA compliance, adopting our existing technology to make the tracking and recording of customer behavior much easier for dealers.”
James explained that this enabled dealers to access records detailing the activity of customers both online and in the showroom, the majority of it recorded automatically.
“The information can include the products they have looked at, the quotes generated, and how the original deal evolved into the final deal. If there was an FCA investigation, this is exactly the data that they would want to see, we believe.”