Whether you are a consumer choosing a financial advisor, a compliance officer onboarding a new counterparty, or a procurement team evaluating a supplier, the first question you should ask about any financial services firm in the UK is: are they authorised by the FCA?
The Financial Conduct Authority requires almost all firms providing financial services in the UK to be authorised or registered. Dealing with an unauthorised firm means you lose the protections of the Financial Ombudsman Service and the Financial Services Compensation Scheme. For regulated firms, working with unauthorised counterparties can expose you to regulatory censure.
This guide explains how to check, what to look for, and why a single check is not enough.
Step 1: Use the FCA Financial Services Register
The FCA maintains the Financial Services Register — a public database of every firm and individual authorised or registered by the FCA and PRA. This is the definitive source for checking whether a firm is regulated.
How to Search
- Visit the Financial Services Register at register.fca.org.uk
- Search by firm name, individual name, or Firm Reference Number (FRN)
- Review the results carefully — firm names can be similar, so verify the registered address and FRN match the firm you are dealing with
What to Check
When you find the firm on the register, verify the following:
- Current status: Is the firm "Authorised" or "Registered"? Check that it has not been cancelled, suspended, or is "no longer authorised."
- Permissions: Does the firm hold the specific Part 4A permissions for the service it is providing to you? A firm authorised for insurance mediation is not necessarily authorised for investment advice.
- Effective dates: When were the permissions granted? Have any been recently varied or removed?
- Requirements or limitations: Are there any requirements or restrictions imposed on the firm's permissions?
- Appointed representatives: If the firm claims to operate as an appointed representative, check that the principal firm is authorised and that the AR relationship is listed on the register.
Step 2: Use the FCA Firm Checker (for Consumers)
The FCA also provides a simpler Firm Checker tool designed for consumers. This gives a straightforward answer about whether a firm is authorised and what it has permission to do. It is useful for quick checks but does not provide the full detail available on the Financial Services Register.
Step 3: Check the FCA Warning List
The FCA maintains a Warning List of firms and individuals it believes are operating without authorisation. If a firm appears on this list, do not deal with them.
However, the absence of a firm from the Warning List does not mean it is safe. Unauthorised firms frequently change their names, and the FCA cannot add firms to the list instantly. Always verify authorisation directly on the Financial Services Register.
What Consumers Should Watch For
If you are a consumer checking whether your financial advisor, mortgage broker, or investment firm is legitimate, here are the warning signs of an unauthorised or fraudulent firm:
- Contact details do not match the register. If the phone number, email, or address you have been given differs from what appears on the Financial Services Register, the firm may be a clone — a scam operation that uses a legitimate firm's details.
- Pressure to act quickly. Legitimate FCA-authorised firms will not pressure you into making immediate decisions.
- Unsolicited contact. Be cautious of firms that contact you out of the blue offering investment opportunities or financial services.
- Returns that seem too good. If the promised returns are significantly higher than the market rate, it is likely a scam.
Why a One-Off Check Is Not Enough
Here is where the story changes for compliance professionals. Checking the FCA register once — at onboarding — is a necessary first step, but it is not sufficient.
Regulatory Status Changes Over Time
A firm that is fully authorised today could have its permissions varied, suspended, or cancelled tomorrow. The FCA regularly takes action against firms:
- In 2024/25, the FCA cancelled the authorisation of 1,456 firms
- The FCA issued 37 Final Notices and imposed fines of over £186 million
- 130 enforcement investigations were open as of March 2025
If your compliance process relies on a point-in-time check at onboarding, you will not discover these changes until your next periodic review — which could be months away.
Common Changes That Affect Your Business
The following changes on the FCA register can directly affect your business relationship with a firm:
- Permissions varied or cancelled — the firm may no longer be authorised for the activities that are relevant to your business
- Requirements imposed — the FCA may restrict what the firm can do, such as prohibiting it from taking on new business
- Enforcement action — a final notice, fine, or public censure indicates serious regulatory failings
- Status changed — the firm may be "in administration", "in liquidation", or "no longer authorised"
- Appointed representative status changed — the AR relationship may have been terminated by the principal firm
The Regulatory Expectation
The FCA expects regulated firms to conduct ongoing due diligence on the firms they work with. SYSC (Senior Management Arrangements, Systems and Controls) sets out expectations for compliance monitoring and oversight. The FCA's rules on outsourcing and third-party management (SYSC 8) require firms to monitor their third-party arrangements on an ongoing basis.
Periodic checks — monthly, quarterly, or annual — create gaps. The longer the interval between checks, the greater the risk that a material change goes undetected.
How to Move from One-Off Checks to Continuous Monitoring
For compliance teams managing portfolios of 10, 50, or hundreds of regulated firms, manual periodic checking is the traditional approach. But it has well-documented limitations:
- It takes significant time. Checking a single firm thoroughly takes several minutes. For a portfolio of 50 firms, a monthly check consumes 20+ hours.
- It creates gaps. Monthly checks mean up to 30 days of exposure to undetected changes.
- It is prone to human error. Repetitive manual comparison across dozens of data points inevitably leads to missed changes.
- It produces weak audit trails. Spreadsheets do not automatically record what the register showed at each point in time.
Automated monitoring solves these problems by checking the FCA register continuously and alerting you the moment a change occurs. This eliminates the gap between when a change happens and when your team becomes aware of it.
FRN Watch automates FCA register monitoring for compliance teams. Add the firms you work with, and receive instant alerts when their regulatory status, permissions, warnings, or enforcement actions change. Start your free trial or book a demo to see how it works.