News

This meeting followed a joint demand of the three French trade unions addressed to the Bank of France Governor and based on UNI Europa Finance campaign on responsible sales of financial products.



A new supervisory authority has been set up in France in January 2010: the Prudential Control Authority ("Authorité de Contrôle Prudentiel" in French). It is the fruit of the merger of the four former supervisory authorities that were in charge of seperate sectors.



The purpose of this meeting with ACP managers was to get information on how the new supervisory authority would be going to accomplish its tasks, in particular ensuring consumer protection. French affiliates raised the point that the ACP should be aware of the major problem that inappropriate sales practices constitute in the finance sector and thus should take into account finance employees' views.



Another purpose was also to ensure that trade union representatives would be involved in ACP work, in one way or another, since employee representatives are no longer taken into account in the new supervisory system.



The deputy general secretary recognised that it is nowadays necessary to supervise sales practices in order to ensure consumer protection. This is a key priority for the French Government, he said. Indeed, in the course of the setting up of the new supervisory authority, an amendment has been voted, requiring the ACP to list all the good sales practices into a code.



Furthermore, to ensure consumer protection, the ACP will be in charge of controling the full respect of the different regulations as well as code of conducts and rules of good practices, with the possibility to sanction those who are not in compliance with ACP's recommandations.



In this regard, the French Affiliates offered the ACP deputy general secretary an example of the UNI Finance Charter on responsible sales of financial products launched in Copenhagen 10 June 2010. This Charter is of much interest, he declared. If a financial institution decides to sign the Charter, the ACP would be able to ensure that the articles of the Charter are fully respected.



In order to accomplish its tasks, a Direction of the control of commercial practices has been set up within the ACP. It will base its work on three major axis:



- Controls of documents (collecting a maximum of documents from a financial institution, notably on training and remuneration schemes) and controls on the premises (at the financial institution headquarters)

- New financial products and advertising campaigns supervision;

- Complaints follow-up.



The banking and the insurance sectors will be covered, as well as their intermediaries (brokers...).



The ACP is not opposed to a regular dialogue with trade unions. The law allows it to set up consultative commissions, in which the participation of trade union representatives is possible, according to the ECP deputy general secretary. Finance employees have a deep experience on commercial practices, he said. The decision to set up a commission will be taken after the summer break.



Finally, regardless of a formal trade union participation in ACP work, the ACP deputy general secretary added that it was interesting to have also an informal but regular dialogue with trade union federations on a rythm to be defined.