The FCA has begun a review on how it recovers the costs of processing applications for authorisation.
Releasing a discussion paper today on paying for the 'regulatory gateway', it said the original policy of former regulator, the FSA, has not changed since 2000, and has not been reviewed since 2006/07.
The rates have not changed since 2001, apart from a reduction in the 'straightforward' fees paid by the smallest firms in 2004.
See table below for fees.


The FCA said: "Consequently, the fees have gone down in real terms – by about 36% – since they have not been adjusted for inflation."
The fees are paid for the application and are non-recoverable even if the regulator does not give approval.
Once a firm has been authorised, it is liable to pay the FCA annual periodic fees.
The FCA said: "Those authorisation costs that are not recovered directly from applicants are recovered from the wider population of fee-payers through periodic fees. "
The total revenue from authorisation and Variation of Permission application fees was approximately £2.7m in 2013/14 – meaning 65% of the cost of the teams dealing with these chargeable processes was recovered through periodic fees.
The gateway functions are undertaken by the Authorisations Division- which cost £31m in 2013/14 in total.
This included direct charges for staff and indirect charges for IT systems, rent, training and recruitment.
The direct staff costs of the teams undertaking applications and VoPs were about £4.5m in 2013/14.
Adding in their share of indirect charges brings the total to approximately £7.9m – around a quarter of the total cost of the Authorisations Division.
The discussion paper stated: "Since our gateway controls the entry of all firms to the market, our authorisations policies and processes are integral to each of the statutory objectives set for the FCA when it was established last year – consumer protection, market integrity and competition.
"In this paper, we are looking only at how we recover the costs of the gateway, and this is most relevant to our competition duty to promote effective competition in the interests of consumers when taking actions to pursue our consumer protection and integrity objectives.
"We need to ensure that cost recovery is structured to avoid unjustified barriers to entry into or expansion within the markets we regulate."
The document affects all firms already regulated by the FCA and the PRA, and any firm considering undertaking financial services business from 1 April 2015 onwards.
The FCA will issue proposals for consultation in October, with a view to introducing the new structure from 1 April 2015.
You can comment on the paper by 22 August in writing or online:

Fill out the form via this link:


Or write to:
David Cheesman
Finance Division – Fees Policy
Financial Conduct Authority
25 The North Colonnade
Canary Wharf
London E14 5HS