United Kingdom Prudential Regulation Authority reminds firms to include potentially FSCS protected deposits in tariff base and branch return reporting

The United Kingdom Prudential Regulation Authority has reminded firms of their obligations on identifying, marking and reporting Financial Services Compensation Scheme protected deposits after receiving queries from industry. It highlighted that the class A tariff base reported annually to the Financial Conduct Authority must include both covered deposits and balances in accounts holding funds to which the account holder is not absolutely entitled, or safeguarded funds, unless the firm has confirmed those balances are not covered deposits. Where a deposit may potentially be FSCS protected and the firm does not have enough information to conclude that it is ineligible, it should be included under rule 43.1(2). The PRA said these amounts should be calculated consistently with the single customer view and exclusions view requirements in Chapter 12 of the Depositor Protection Part of the PRA Rulebook. Deposits falling into this category will typically include trust accounts, client money accounts and safeguarded accounts. International branches must also reflect rules 43.1(1) and 43.1(2) when calculating total potential liability to the FSCS in the Branch Return, a metric the PRA considers under SS5/21 when assessing whether an international bank can undertake retail activities in the United Kingdom through a branch. Where these deposits materially cause a branch to exceed the indicative threshold, firms are encouraged to explain the relevant deposit types in the Firm Notes field, noting that the PRA applies a firm-by-firm assessment and does not treat the factors as hard thresholds. The PRA expects firms to prepare year-end reporting on this basis and make any necessary corrections before year-end reporting for 2026.