There was some good news for advisers on the regulatory front this week.
In the opinion of the Financial Ombudsman Service itself, the decision to start charging fees from personal representatives assisting with complaints is already seeing a fall in the number of complaints pursued.
Advisers will probably know them better as Claims Management Companies or (and they don't like this term) claims chasers.
Citywire New Model Adviser reports here with the headline 'FOS sees drop in complaints after move to charge CMCs case fees' a good summation.
This analysis from lawyer Norton Rose Fullbright is also useful. It writes that charges were introduced for personal representatives (PRs) who bring in more than 10 complaints per year on 1 April, and there has been a drop in case brought by those representatives from 36,000 to 30,800 in the same period as last year.
However it notes that it is anticapted that there will be even fewer complaints in the next quarter. as PRs submit better evidenced complaints and consider their merits more diligently.
All good news for the sector with more FOS changes to come regarding consistency of decisions, applying the rules in force at the time and not behaving as a rival regulator to the FCA, again addressed in the legal analysis so it may be worth a read.
The following certainly feels like another big improvement which the sector has seen in recent years.
Simpler pension transfers took an average of 10.8 days to complete between July 2024 and June 2025, down from 11 days at the end of March according to the latest Origo Transfer Index. It's a small fall but hopefully progress will continue and it will fall under 10 days on average.
As Money Marketing reports the overall figure including more complicated cases is 12.4 days.
Rather impressive business figures from Royal London. Net inflows rose to £4.1bn for the first half of 2025, up from just £77m a year earlier. The increase was driven by £1.6bn of net inflows into its Governed Range and a £4.6bn multi-asset mandate from St James’s Place. Money Marketing reports.
The Bank of England has cut interest rates by 0.25% to 4% albeit after an unprecedented two votes as Bloomberg reports. Much of has been made of the fact that one Monetary Policy Committee member wanted a deeper cut voted for such but then was allowed to fall in behind the smaller cut.
Pensions specialist Nathan Bridgeman has launched a petition to stop pensions coming into the scope of IHT as FTAdviser reports.
Bridgeman, who is the director of SeaBridge Ssas, had his petition accepted by the House of Commons late this week and currently has 137 signatures.
It is unlikely that such a petition would succeed but it does highlight very specific challenges for Bridgeman's client base where assets such as farms or the factory could be placed within the Ssas structure and now face double taxation and a liquidity squeeze.
That may well feed a lot of conjecture and discussion in markets. In terms of what it means for consumers of many kinds, I always think ThisisMoney does a very thorough look at what it means for borrowers and savers.
Back to specific adviser matters. Citywire's titles do a lot of very good analysis about this sort of thing. "Large advice firms increasingly hold more power to win advantageous share class deals with asset managers. Citywire New Model Adviser speaks to advice CIOs and industry experts to understand why.
I get the feeling we are going to see more of this - Elston Consulting head of research Henry Cobbe says the firm got tired of waiting for regulatory guidance and has launched its sustainable range of model portfolios built with 100% Sustainable Disclosure Regime funds, ahead of the wider market. Professional Adviser relates his views.
