The FCA is preparing to lift restrictions on the onboarding of new customers at UK fintech firm Modulr subject to advance notification.
At the beginning of October 2023, FCA issued a restriction for the company, preventing it from bringing new partner clients, such as agents and distributors who use its payments infrastructure for cards or accounts.
The company agreed to temporarily pause onboarding certain new customer segments in the UK, due to the many new and revised UK regulations coming into force in 2023 and 2024. These include regulatory changes such as the new UK consumer duty, adjustments to push payment fraud reimbursement, and a ban on incentive marketing for high-risk assets like crypto.
Modulr delivers payments infrastructure for over 200 top-tier customers, including Revolut, Wagestream, Sage and BrightPay, and currently processes an annualised transaction value of more than £100bn.
In lifting the ban, the FCA states: “The firm has agreed with the Authority that it will not without providing prior written notification to the Authority of at least 10 business days, on-board any new agent and/or distributor.”
Modulr says: “Following a temporary pause in onboarding new Agent & Distributor (A&D) Partners in the UK, we have made a number of enhancements to our A&D Partner onboarding and oversight processes.
“Having now implemented these changes as well as undertaking extensive internal and external testing and assurance, we have agreed with the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) to recommence new A&D Partner onboarding subject to providing advanced notice of each A&D Partner.”