MotoNovo Finance believes dealers and lenders are demonstrating a “worryingly slow” response to the challenge of being ready for the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) changes next year.

As of the April 1, 2014 dealers who have not gained their ‘interim permission’ from the FCA will be unable to offer or become involved with consumer credit activities, this even includes dealing with settlements.

Going a little further, because there will be no immediate register of appropriately authorised organisations, dealers will need to demonstrate their status to their finance companies.

MotoNovo Finance bases its views on research it completed in early November.

Karl Werner, head of sales and marketing at MotoNovo Finance, said: “Dealers and lenders need to become far more engaged with what we see as a significant change and one that offers the right business a great opportunity on which to capitalise.

“We are updating guidance on our website on a regular basis to facilitate the change process as well as working closely with our dealer network to ensure they are ready for the deadline next year.

“What we really want dealers to recognise is that the forthcoming change is absolutely time bound and that it will be the start of some very significant changes in the way finance is offered in the showroom. It is not set to be a simple tick box exercise.”

The results below are part of MotoNovo’s ongoing omnibus research which is undertaken each month. The research takes the view of a cross-section of supporting and non supporting dealers, including franchised and independent dealers. The research was completed in the first two weeks of November with around 100 interviews.

  • 7% of dealers believed they had their interim permission
  • 58% believed that someone in their organisation was dealing with this issue
  • 22% were looking into it but had issues about how best to apply and what categories to apply for
  • 12% had not yet applied and were awaiting guidance/options
  • 11% had done nothing to date