Navigating your way around most financial services and products can be a frightening prospect.

Being bombarded with acronyms and financial concepts that few people actually understand puts the consumer at a serious disadvantage. And it's this lack of knowledge that can sometimes leave us open to deception and exploitation.

Consumers aren't the only ones who need protection. Businesses across the UK are equally vulnerable as they rely on financial services for loans and investment that can support scaling and growth.

 

A massive industry

The size of the UK's financial services sector makes these challenges even greater. A quick look at some numbers and you will immediately appreciate how substantial this industry really is.

The sector employs over 1 million people and in 2023 contributed £208.2 billion to the UK economy. That's 8.8% of total economic output. In 2024 the UK comfortably retained the title of the world's largest net exporter (exports minus imports) of financial services, generating a trade surplus of $127 billion, almost double that of the US ($64.2bn), and more than the combined surpluses of Singapore ($37.7bn), Switzerland ($31bn) and Luxembourg ($30bn).

The UK is also a world leader when it comes to commercial insurance, derivatives, debt issuance, commodities trading and foreign exchange. Only the US boasts larger asset management and fintech sectors.

Given the sheer scale of the UK's financial services, keeping things in check is absolutely crucial for ensuring that the sector remains honest and competitive, serves consumers appropriately, and helps businesses to flourish.

That responsibility lies with the Financial Conduct Authority.

 

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA)

The FCA is an independent public body established in 2013 for the purpose of regulating the UK’s financial services industry and overseeing the conduct of businesses so as to ensure fair treatment of consumers, market integrity, and healthy competition.

We enable a fair and thriving financial services market, for the good of consumers and the economy.

Source: fca.org.uk

Regulation and oversight cover both retail and wholesale financial firms, including banks, advisors, and insurers.

How do they regulate?

The FCA works towards achieving its objectives by:

• Making new rules and issuing guidance and standards.
• Detecting market-wide harm and putting in place remedies through market studies.
• Authorising or registering financial firms and individuals.

Firm's must demonstrate that they meet a range of requirements stipulated by the FCA before the authority will grant them authorisation to perform certain activities.

A Register of all FCA authorised firms and individuals is made freely searchable online. Members of the public can use the Register to:

• Find out what a person or firm are regulated to do and what protections are there when doing business with them.
• Check that the permissions/activities of the firm match the service it's providing you.
• Confirm that you are dealing with the genuine firm before doing business with them.

All authorised firms and individuals are subject to FCA supervision to make sure that standards and rules are complied with.

We regulate financial services firms and markets in the UK, setting standards for firms to meet and holding them to account if they don't.

Source: fca.org.uk

Held to account

Not adhering to FCA standards can result in serious financial penalties.

In 2025, for example, the FCA imposed substantial fines on three major UK banking institutions for falling short on financial crime controls.

• Nationwide Building Society: £44 million for inadequate anti-financial crime systems and controls.
• Barclays: £42 million for failings in financial crime risk management.
• Monzo: £21 million for repeated breaches when onboarding high-risk customers.

These numbers give some idea of how seriously the FCA takes its work.

 

GlobalWebPay and the FCA

As you would expect, trusted international money transfer companies like GlobalWebPay (FCA reference number: 631844) are fully authorised and subject to the same high degree of regulation and oversight as other financial firms under the FCAs remit.

This is just one of the many reasons you can trust GlobalWebPay to safely and securely make international payments on your behalf.

If you aren't already using GlobalWebPay, why not sign up now and pay no transfer fee on your FIRST transfer by applying the FEEFREE voucher at checkout

Create your free account