Recommendation 16

The FCA hosts a warning list on its website. The warning list publishes details of unregulated entities which appear to be carrying out an FCA regulated activity without the requisite authorisation or permission. The Minister for Pensions and Financial Inclusion told us that the powers under section 125 of the Pension Schemes Act do not allow a transfer to be blocked by a warning list operated by a third party organisation, such as the FCA. We recommend that inclusion on the FCA warning list should constitute a red flag. If this is not possible, then the red flags developed by DWP should be defined in such a way that any firm or individual appearing on the FCA warning list would trigger a red flag.