What are credit related regulated activities?

Under the new arrangements, consumer credit activities are known as credit-related regulated activities detailed within the Regulated Activities Order but only some of these may be undertaken by a firm under the Institute’s Consumer Credit (Transitional Arrangements) Regulations as listed below:

• Consumer credit;
• Credit brokerage;
• Debt adjusting;
• Debt counselling;
• Debt administration;
• Entering into a regulated credit agreement as lender;
• Providing credit information services; and
• Agreeing to carry on a regulated activity so far as relevant to any of the above activities.

It is worth remembering that in considering credit-related regulated activities, a client is a ‘consumer’ who is defined as:

• An individual;
• A partnership consisting of two or three persons of which at least one partner is an individual; or
• An unincorporated body that does not consist entirely of bodies corporate and that is not a partnership.

If the client is not a consumer, the activity is not a credit-related regulated activity.