RDC success in pro-bono appearance for Nicholas Hill

Nicholas Hill successfully appeared before the Regulatory Decisions Committee (RDC) of the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) on 20 April 2016. His client was the team leader in a large UK bank which had paid a multimillion pound fine as a result of failures identified by the FCA in respect of its Payment Protection Insurance complaint handling process.

The FCA’s Enforcement Team proposed to impose a prohibition order on Nicholas’ client prohibiting his client from performing any function in relation to any regulated activity carried on by an authorised person, exempt person or professional firm. Enforcement proposed (what is often described as) a time limited prohibition order with a duration of two years but the significance of any prohibition for Nicholas’ client would have been very serious indeed. It would have ended, to all intents and purposes, Nicholas’ client’s ability to ever work in the FS industry again.

After written representations and oral submissions the RDC referred the matter back to the Enforcement team to issue a Notice of Discontinuance.

Nicholas was instructed by Arnold & Porter (UK) LLP partner Tim Aron through the Financial Services Lawyers Association pro bono scheme.

News 11 May, 2016