The financial promotion prohibition and the consumer credit regime — two sets of rules under FSMA 2000 that legal work can trigger when it strays into financial services.
A routine communication or a small piece of credit-related work can carry criminal liability and leave agreements unenforceable, so the boundaries of both regimes matter. This chapter opens with an overview of the two regimes before breaking down the financial promotion prohibition into its elements, the distinctions between real-time and non-real-time, solicited and unsolicited communications, the Article 28 one-off exemption, and the criminal and contractual consequences of getting it wrong. It then turns to consumer credit: what makes a credit agreement regulated or exempt, the regulated activities — such as credit broking and debt counselling — that a solicitor might carry on, and the Part XX exemption that permits them without authorisation. It closes with the consequences where regulated activity is carried on without authorisation, from unenforceable agreements to criminal penalties and the available defence.
