The financial watchdog has confirmed the rules funeral plan providers should follow from next July, including a ban on cold calling, as it aims to raise industry standards to ensure plans provide better value to customers.
The Financial Conduct Authority said the providers must start planning for the new regulatory regime or prepare to leave the market in an orderly manner.
The new rules will see
- funeral instalment plan products will always deliver a funeral (after a moratorium period) as we will be banning those that don’t guarantee this
- cold calling will be banned and new standards on advertising will be implemented to ensure plans are sold fairly
- commission payments to intermediaries will be banned to ensure products represent fair value
- those selling funeral plans are subject to full checks on their fitness to operate to improve governance standards and oversight
Sheldon Mills, Executive Director, Consumers and Competition at the FCA commented on the new rules: ‘Funeral plans should provide customers with comfort and certainty that their affairs are in order.
Our new rules for the sector will drive up standards and ensure that when consumers buy a plan, they receive a product that matches their needs and expectations. We are banning all commission payments to intermediaries to make sure products offer fair value, and, having seen the real harm cold calling can cause consumers, we’ll be banning it.
