FCA tells Senior Managers to decide.
On 27 March 2020 the FCA published guidance on the way in which FCA-regulated firms should prioritise which members of staff should continue to travel to the office during the Coronavirus public health emergency.
The FCA makes clear that each firm’s designated Senior Manager or equivalent person is responsible for identifying which of their employees are unable to perform their jobs from home. It states that employers should take “every possible step” to facilitate staff working from home. As a minimum, it expects that individuals in the following roles would not be expected either to travel to the office or to meet customers in face-to-face meetings:
- financial advisers (as they can offer their services online or by phone);
- staff who can safely and securely trade shares and financial instruments from home;
- business support staff such as those in IT (unless they are looking after specific equipment or technology); and
- claims management companies and those selling non-essential goods and credit.
The FCA expects the number of exceptions to the above list to be low. As such, it expects that the total number of roles requiring an ongoing physical presence in the office to be far smaller than the number of workers needed to ensure all of a firm’s business activities continue to function on a business as usual basis.
Corterum makes it easy to remain compliant with SM&CR, even when you’re working from home. Get in touch to learn more about how we can help.
