Stakeholder Consultation on Collection of Financial Services Industry Levy

Who is the FSPO?

The Office of the Financial Services and Pensions Ombudsman was established on 01 January 2018 under the Financial Services and Pensions Ombudsman Act 2017 ('the Act'). The Act dissolved the former Financial Services Ombudsman and the former Office of the Pensions Ombudsman, with the staff from the two bodies joining the newly merged entity.

Under the governing legislation, our principal function is to investigate complaints against financial service or pension providers in a manner which is proportionate to the nature of the complaint. The Act provides discretion for us to undertake these investigations by informal means, by mediation, by formal investigation/hearing or by a combination of these means. Further information about our work is available at www.fspo.ie.

What is this consultation about?

The FSPO has two distinct sources of funding:

  • (a) funding from the Exchequer to support the investigation of complaints against pension providers;
  • (b) funding collected through a financial services levy.
Section 43 of the Financial Services and Pensions Ombudsman Act 2017, sets out how the Financial Services and Pensions Ombudsman Council may make regulations in order to collect a financial services industry levy. The total income due from the Exchequer for 2018 is €950,000, while the levy to be collected from industry in 2018 is €4,336,991.

In 2017, Petrus Consulting was commissioned by the Financial Services Ombudsman Council to examine the levy system and to recommend improvements to the process. The objective is to have a simple system that can be easily maintained and updated and that is acceptable and transparent to Financial Services Providers ("FSPs").

The report compiled by Petrus Consulting raised ten recommendations. This consultation seeks opinions from the public and from key stakeholders in relation to five of the recommendations, pertaining to the manner in which the FSPO collects a financial services levy. The recommendations we are seeking opinion on are 1, 2, 4, 5 and 6. The full report is available here.

Who are we consulting?

This is a public consultation so we want to hear from as many people as possible. We are particularly interested in hearing from financial services providers who are directly affected by the levy we collect. The consultation will run from 18 July 2018 - 31 August 2018. We will also be working through a number of representative bodies to assist us in our stakeholder engagement.

Share your views

To take part in this consultation, please complete the following survey to share your views with us. Upon opening the survey, you will see a brief summary of 5 of the recommendations included in the consultation report, and you will be asked to offer your opinion in relation to each. For further background information in relation to any of the individual recommendations, please read the report by Petrus Consulting here.

What will happen?

We will take all the submissions we receive during the consultation into consideration when deciding how the financial services industry levy will be collected in future, beginning in 2019. We will publish a report on our website in late 2018 with the results of the consultation and the key issues raised.