Resolve Compliance / Governance

Regulatory Inspections take up a material amount of time both pre-visit, during visit and post visit. Additional pressure is placed on already busy teams irrespective of the final outcome. When the findings are known there may be several areas to address. The final report will advise what you need to remediate but not how to remediate. We can help resolve post inspection issues promptly.

The time between notification of an onsite inspection, receipt of the pre-visit information request and the arrival of the regulator into your business must be utilised in the best way possible. We know that this can be a stressful time. You may have been through these visits many times before however you are unlikely to have experienced a PRISM based visit. We are able to provide practical pre-visit advice, preparatory action plans, review materials and ensure that the business is as prepared as possible. We draw your attention to our PRISM health check. If you do not wish to wait until you receive notification of a visit we can complete a health check at any time.

We offer a choice of quarterly/half year/full year reviews. The areas covered within the review can be tailored to your requirements and budget. An independent report with recommendations if appropriate or even just to confirm ‘all green’ on a periodic basis can give comfort to exec and non-exec directors, shareholders and other stakeholders. The resulting report can be tabled to the board and can form of your risk management framework.

Situations may arise when undertaking due diligence which cause difficulty in assessing or managing the risk. We are able to offer guidance and recommendations on a case by case basis.

We understand that there may be occasions when you would prefer to have a second opinion or to provide a second layer of review. We are on hand to assist whenever you need us. No matter is too small, we would be delighted to help.

It is vital for a business to ensure that its compliance function is adequately resourced. We can provide assistance on an ad-hoc or short term basis or offer our innovative ‘by the hour’ recruitment service, click here for more details.

Risks associated with outsourcing are firmly on regulators radars (not just in Guernsey). A solid framework to assess and manage outsourcing risk should be in place. We can assist with review of your existing framework, draft a framework for you or review and report on an existing relationship. Outsourcing will be scrutinised as part of a PRISM onsite visit and it is important that your business is fully prepared.

We offer a full suite of health checks for both new and established financial services businesses.  Our independent review can provide comfort as to existing arrangements or can highlight areas which would benefit from attention.    Health checks can be tailored to the specific needs of the business. We are on hand to assist with remedial work if required or can simply give comfort on the output.  See here for more details.

It is important that policies and procedures are regularly reviewed and updated. Further it is vital that the business is following its policies and procedures and that staff can demonstrate an awareness of the content. We appreciate that each business is different and we would be happy to take your existing compliance manual and associated policies and update them to reflect current regulatory requirements and best practice.

A firm can have a great set of policies, procedures and controls, but if staff are not following them your business is exposed to significant risk.  Therefore monitoring of employees compliance with your firm's procedures and the regulatory environment through sample testing is essential.  We can help to ensure that your compliance monitoring programme is up to date and remain effective.