BCD a glowing report
Depending upon your accounting year end date, your GABRIEL might turn up nine months before Christmas however the FCA’s version is anything but angelic! In fact, many encountering it for the first time might believe it has been sent from the very bowels of hell to test their patience with even the roots of the acronym –GAthering Better Regulatory Information Electronically – proving devilishly difficult to get your head around on first glance!
GABRIEL is the FCA’s system for reporting, collecting, validating and storing regulatory data, and it is mandatory for everyone authorised by the FCA to complete a report on an annual basis. The report is due at the end of a firm’s financial year but, if this is your first year of being directly regulated by the FCA, then you only need to report on the period from which you became authorised. This means that some lucky souls will only have a few weeks of information on which to report, whilst others will be facing inputting data from a whole year of regulation.
Whilst GABRIEL isn’t deliberately tricky or complex, completing it for the first time is more than likely going to present a few challenges so I would urge you to leave yourself plenty of time to ensure you don’t have to try and rush through your submission; particularly if it’s your first time.
One particular point of which you need to be aware is that the levels of permission held by a firm will dictate the information on which they need to report. However, even within the category of all firms who hold full permissions, there are further differentials which may mean that it’s necessary to complete CCR001, CCR002 or CCR003. Please do make certain before beginning your submission, as I doubt having to start again from scratch will be anybody’s idea of fun!
AOBP’s Compliance Hub, powered by the Consumer Credit Centre, contains all the tools and guidance you need to ensure that you get a head start with GABRIEL. The SimplyBiz Group, of which the Consumer Credit Centre is a part, has many years of experience and a highly skilled specialist team, and that’s just one of the reasons why AOBP has chosen to partner with us.
If you have any questions on the information in this article, or any other area of regulation or compliance support, please don’t hesitate to get in touch with the Consumer Credit Centre team on 01484 443424.
David Golder
Managing Director
Consumer Credit Centre
SimplyBiz Group