New FCA Rules on Non-Financial Misconduct in Financial Services

JD Supra Finance & Banking

Published April 2nd, 2026

Detected April 2nd, 2026

Summary

The UK FCA published a new webpage and final rules on non-financial misconduct (NFM) including bullying, harassment and violence, effective September 1, 2026. The FCA introduces new rule COCON 1.1.7FR extending conduct rules to cover bullying, harassment or violence against colleagues, and updates FIT guidance for fitness assessments. Affected firms must review and update staff policies, conduct breach reporting, FIT assessments, and regulatory references.

View original document View source feed page

What changed

The FCA has finalized new rules and guidance on non-financial misconduct (NFM) through policy statement PS25/23, amending the FCA Handbook. The key change is new rule COCON 1.1.7FR, which extends conduct rules in non-banking firms to cover bullying, harassment or violence against colleagues where there is a sufficient work-related link. The FCA is also amending the Fit and Proper sourcebook (FIT) to provide guidance on assessing NFM when determining fitness and propriety, including conduct outside the workplace, social media use, and unproven allegations. COCON and FIT operate separately: COCON focuses on work-related misconduct while FIT allows firms to take a broader range of NFM into account.

Firms must prepare for the September 1, 2026 effective date by reviewing and updating staff policies, conduct breach reporting processes, FIT assessments, and regulatory references. Staff and managers need to understand how the changes apply. Importantly, firms are not required to conduct retrospective analysis of past conduct breaches or revise past FIT assessments, nor monitor employees' private lives or social media accounts. The rule does not apply retrospectively and does not extend FCA's regulatory remit beyond Senior Managers and Certification Regime financial activities.

What to do next

Review and update staff policies to address non-financial misconduct including bullying, harassment, and violence
Update conduct breach reporting processes to incorporate NFM requirements under new COCON 1.1.7FR
Revise FIT assessment procedures to incorporate guidance on assessing NFM including conduct outside the workplace
Ensure staff and managers understand how the new rules apply to them

Source document (simplified)

April 2, 2026

New UK FCA Webpage On Non-Financial Misconduct In Financial Services

A&O Shearman + Follow Contact LinkedIn Facebook X Send Embed

The UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has published a new webpage setting out how firms should prepare for the new rules and guidance to help tackle non‑financial misconduct (NFM), which will come into force on 1 September. The FCA explains that NFM includes behaviour that is not of a clearly financial nature such as bullying, harassment and violence. It notes that if left unchecked, such conduct can harm individuals, firms and confidence in financial services. The changes are implemented through amendments to the FCA Handbook set out in policy statement PS25/23, published in December 2025.

In particular, the FCA is amending the Code of Conduct sourcebook (COCON) by introducing a new rule (COCON 1.1.7FR), which extends the scope of the conduct rules in non-banking firms to cover bullying, harassment or violence against colleagues, where it relates to an individual's role and where there is a sufficient work-related link. The rule will not apply retrospectively and does not extend the FCA's regulatory remit beyond Senior Managers and Certification Regime financial activities.

The FCA is also amending the Fit and Proper sourcebook (FIT) to provide additional guidance on how firms should assess NFM when determining fitness and propriety. The FCA makes clear that COCON and FIT operate separately: the new COCON rule focuses on certain work-related misconduct, while the new FIT guidance clarifies how firms can take a broader range of NFM into account when assessing fitness and propriety. This includes certain conduct outside the workplace, including private life, social media use and unproven allegations.

Ahead of 1 September, firms should review whether they need to update their approach to: (i) staff policies; (ii) conduct breach reporting; (iii) FIT assessments; and (iv) regulatory references. Firms should also ensure staff and managers understand how the changes apply to them. Firms will not be required to carry out retrospective analysis to check whether they have correctly determined past conduct rule breaches nor revise past FIT assessments. They also do not need to monitor employees' private lives or social media accounts, investigate allegations about employees' private lives if they are trivial, implausible or irrelevant nor do anything contrary to privacy, employment or other relevant law.

[View source.]

Send Print Report

Latest Posts

DISCLAIMER: Because of the generality of this update, the information provided herein may not be applicable in all situations and should not be acted upon without specific legal advice based on particular situations.
Attorney Advertising.

Written by:

A&O Shearman Contact + Follow more less

PUBLISH YOUR CONTENT ON JD SUPRA

✔ Increased readership
✔ Actionable analytics
✔ Ongoing writing guidance Join more than 70,000 authors publishing their insights on JD Supra

Start Publishing »

Published In:

Anti-Harassment Policies + Follow Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) + Follow Financial Regulatory Reform + Follow Financial Services Industry + Follow New Guidance + Follow New Rules + Follow Policies and Procedures + Follow Regulatory Reform + Follow Reporting Requirements + Follow UK + Follow Workplace Bullying + Follow Workplace Violence + Follow Consumer Protection + Follow Finance & Banking + Follow Labor & Employment + Follow more less

A&O Shearman on:

"My best business intelligence, in one easy email…"

Your first step to building a free, personalized, morning email brief covering pertinent authors and topics on JD Supra: Sign Up Log in ** By using the service, you signify your acceptance of JD Supra's Privacy Policy.* - hide - hide