Lista Cannon & Ian Pegram note the important lessons to emerge from the FSA’s recent activity
The UK Financial Services Authority (FSA) issued its largest ever fine for financial crime systems and controls failures on 21 July 2011. The FSA fined Willis Limited, the UK arm of the world’s third largest insurance and reinsurance broker, £6.895m.
While the present action was pursued under the UK’s financial regulatory framework, the FSA’s reasoning provides important guidance to businesses in all sectors on how the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) may assess whether anti-bribery procedures are “adequate” for the purpose of the Bribery Act 2010 (BA 2010).
Background
The FSA examined Willis’s policies to counter the risks of corruption associated with making payments to overseas third parties who assisted Willis in winning business from overseas clients.
While the FSA acknowledged that Willis had in place a number of policies and procedures aimed at limiting and detecting corruption issues, it found that Willis had not taken reasonable care to establish and maintain effective anti-bribery systems and controls, but had created a “weak control environment” which
