Jersey: Consultation on revisions to Codes of Practice

Today, the Jersey Financial Services Commission (the “Commission”) has issued a Consultation Paper on proposals to update the Codes of Practice (“Codes”) that are issued under the four Regulatory Laws administered by the Commission. Codes of Practice establish high level principles for the conduct of business and also more detailed rules to explain how the principles must be met.

Many of the proposed changes to the Codes will have the effect of aligning requirements, so that there is improved consistency in provisions across all seven sets of Codes. For example, it is proposed to introduce greater consistency with:

• provisions that deal with “span of control”, so that there are consistent requirements governing the number of individuals that must be involved in the day to day management of a financial institution, and who may take part in that management;
  
  
• the insurance arrangements that financial institutions must have in place; and


• the types of events that trigger a requirement to provide information to the Commission and the period of time in
  which a financial institution has to notify the Commission that an event has happened.

Other changes are particular to a financial sector and therefore to a single set of Codes, and augment existing requirements

or set new ones.

The Consultation Paper also invites:

• Comments on the pros and cons of consolidating the seven separate sets of Codes into one single set of Codes,
  in order to streamline the current Code-making process and to better recognise that financial institutions often
  must comply with more than one set of Codes.


• Respondents to consider whether further changes might be made to the Money Service Business Codes,
  ahead of a more general review of the scope of regulation and oversight of this sector later in the year.

The Consultation Paper and links to each set of updated Codes can be viewed on the Commission’s website by clicking here.

Hard copies of the Consultation Paper are available upon request.

An electronic version of each set of updated Codes showing tracked changes will be made available in May 2011.