A director of a mortgage and general insurance firm has been banned by The FSA from holding senior positions in the financial services industry after his failure to comply with rules of handling client money resulted in the loss of approximately £85,000 of his customers’ money.
Matthew Sixsmith was the director of Manchester-based Bridgewater House UK, which dealt in the sub prime mortgage market and also arranged life and critical illness insurance in connection with those mortgages.
When the firm sold an insurance policy, it charged its clients two years’ insurance premiums upfront and then added this amount to the mortgage. The scheme worked by the firm agreeing with its customers that it would hold this money and then pay the insurance premiums to insurers on their behalf.
However, Sixsmith failed to separate his customers’ money from that of the firm. Using only one bank account under the name of the firm, he tried to administer both his business and the premium payments customers had entrusted to him.
As a result, when Sixsmith’s firm ceased trading in September last year, approximately £85,000 of customers’ money was lost as he kept no record of when these payments should begin or end for each of the firm’s customers.
Full details of the FSAs Final Notice are HERE
