Jurisdiction(s):
United Kingdom

Related legal acts

Key definition

Reference definition

What does Reference mean? In employment practice, a reference is information provided by a current or former employer to a prospective employer about a worker’s employment history, performance and suitability for a role. The term is descriptive rather than statutory, but its legal features are shaped by case law. Across England & Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, an employer owes a duty of care to take reasonable care in preparing a reference so it is true, accurate and fair overall, and not misleading (often cited by reference to Spring v Guardian Assurance). References attract qualified privilege in defamation, defeated by malice, and may give rise...

UK FCA super-complaints and references (FSMA 2000 ss 234C–234D): eligibility, evidence, process, outcomes and recent practice

Published by a LexisNexis Financial Services expert

Practice notes

Background to super-complaints and references

The Financial Services Act 2012 revised the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (FSMA 2000), setting up two routes for ensuring the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) receives significant information. Under FSMA 2000, s 234C, consumer organisations designated by HM Treasury may lodge a ‘super-complaint’ with the FCA. By contrast, FSMA 2000, s 234D permits regulated persons and the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS) to submit ‘references’ to the FCA. In June 2013, acting under FSMA 2000, s 234G, the FCA published guidance on both mechanisms, intended to broadly replicate the super-complaints model long operated by the Office of Fair Trading pursuant to the Enterprise Act 2002. Although closely related, super-complaints and references differ slightly in the nature of the information that must be provided to the FCA. The super-complaints process exists to allow designated consumer bodies to report to the FCA that a feature—or a combination of features—of a UK market for financial services is, or appears to be, materially harming the interests of ‘consumers’ (as that term is defined in FSMA 2000, ss 425A and 425B). For these purposes, ‘consumers’ excludes those consumers who are authorised persons and are therefore outside the consumer definition in this framework...

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Web page updated on 22/05/2026

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