At last. A correspondent daring to criticise the FSA (Peter Brown, Letters, 18 August).
So far, I believe the FSA has shown a breathtaking lack of understanding of how the general insurance industry operates.
The proverbial 99.9% of clients (mine at least) buy solely on bottom line and neither understand nor require regulation.
They regard the vast amounts of extra documentation now required as unnecessary and wasteful and are, in the main, concerned only with how little they have to pay and what is the latest date they can pay it.
In October, I will have been working in broking continuously for 10 years and, believe it or not, I have clients that I have dealt with for that entire period.
For the past seven years, being now semi-retired, I run a small broker as a sole trader with a gross profit of just under £20,000.
The FSA has so far in the past nine months taken 10% of this gross profit, before I factor in increased professional indemnity costs to meet its requirements.
Each week I receive from the FSA on average two circulars headed "Essential reading from the FSA" with a cost to me of between £10 and £30.
I have no computer nor do I wish to acquire one, yet the FSA demands that I submit the retail mediation activities return (RMAR) electronically (for its convenience) or face serious financial punishment, if I do not comply, to offset its increased costs.
I wonder if this infringes my human rights?
All of this is without any increase in income as a result of regulation.
I consider the financial burden of regulation to be intolerable and, as usual, the UK is the only EU country to implement these draconian regulations.
Will the FSA adopt a more pragmatic attitude to regulation with regard to sole-traders? My costs to date do not include the new audit charge burden.
Rod Allcock
Rod Allcock Insurance Services
