Introduction

These Key Rules are designed for smaller general insurance brokers whose operations and customers are all based in the UK.

What do we mean by a general insurance broker?

By ‘general insurance broker' we mean a firm (other than an authorised professional firm) whose only regulated activities involve dealing as agent in, arranging deals in, advising on, or assisting in the administration of non-investment insurance contracts (broadly, general insurance, term assurance contracts, critical illness cover and income protection) and agreeing to carry on these activities. You can check this by looking up your firm's entry on the FSA Register (www.fsa.gov.uk/register).

The Key Rules are drawn from our Handbook of rules and guidance, but to make them easier to use we have supplemented them with some explanatory material.

Key Rules are one of a number of measures the FSA is pursuing to make the Handbook more accessible. To this end we have identified the rules that are most relevant to general insurance brokers in their day-to-day customer-facing work. We have also included the main systems and controls rules to give users an overview of the kinds of systems and controls their firm should have in place.

When using Key Rules it is important to be aware that there are other rules and guidance within the Handbook that may be relevant to your situation.