Do FCA regulated companies have to record calls?

Some do, some don’t. If your firm carries on MiFID-scope investment business - dealing, arranging or managing investments in financial instruments - SYSC 10A of the FCA Handbook requires you to record the relevant phone calls. Most IFAs can keep a written note instead, and insurance and mortgage intermediaries generally aren’t caught by the taping rule at all.

That’s the short answer. The longer answer is that “am I caught by the taping rule?” turns out to be the wrong question for a lot of small firms - because even firms with no recording obligation keep ending up in situations where a recording is the only thing that would have settled the argument.

I run a mobile network that builds call recording, so up front: this is not legal or compliance advice. It’s a plain-English map of the rules, verified against the FCA Handbook and FCA publications. Your firm’s position depends on your permissions - confirm it with your compliance adviser. If you want a two-minute starting point, try our free call recording requirement checker.

What does SYSC 10A actually require?

SYSC 10A is the section of the FCA’s Senior Management Arrangements, Systems and Controls sourcebook titled “Recording telephone conversations and electronic communications” - the UK implementation of the MiFID II taping regime. For firms in scope, it requires taking all reasonable steps to record telephone conversations, and keep copies of electronic communications, that relate to in-scope activities in financial instruments: receiving and transmitting orders, executing orders, dealing on own account, and portfolio management.

Two things people miss. First, it’s channel-neutral - a mobile call, an SMS and a WhatsApp message are treated the same as a deskphone call. Second, it covers the conversations around the deal, not just the deal itself - more on that below.

Which firms are caught by the FCA taping rule?

Plain-English version, always subject to your actual permissions:

The pattern: the taping rule follows the activity (business in financial instruments), not the FCA badge. Being “FCA regulated” doesn’t itself trigger it - and a firm that’s mostly outside can still be caught for a specific business line, such as an adviser arranging investments alongside mortgage work.

What does “intended to result in a transaction” mean?

SYSC 10A doesn’t only cover the call where the order is placed. The rule captures conversations and communications that are intended to result in in-scope activities being carried out - even if no transaction ever happens. The FCA reinforced this in Market Watch 66: recording policies must identify communications intended to lead up to in-scope activities, or where there’s a reasonable prospect of them being performed - which, depending on the circumstances, can include internal conversations.

Practically, that kills the “we’ll only record the important calls” approach. You rarely know at the start of a call whether it’s going to turn into one that should have been recorded. Which is why in-scope firms record the whole line.

Do mobile phones and WhatsApp count?

Yes. The obligations apply to conversations made with, sent from or received on equipment the firm provides - or permits - for business use. There’s no mobile exemption, no working-from-home exemption, and no “it was on WhatsApp” exemption: the FCA has said plainly that if unmonitored or encrypted apps are used for in-scope activities on business devices, they must be recorded and auditable. We’ve covered the app side separately in can you record WhatsApp calls?

For a small firm, this is usually where theory meets reality: the deskphone is recorded, but the business actually runs on someone’s mobile.

How long must recordings be kept?

For SYSC 10A records: five years from the date the record was made, extendable to up to seven years where the FCA requests it. Records must be stored in a durable medium, can’t be alterable, and the client involved is entitled to a copy on request.

Firms outside the taping rule set their own retention under general record-keeping and UK GDPR principles - commonly six months to six years depending on the business. Our free retention calculator gives you a defensible starting point either way.

What do small firms actually do in practice?

Here’s the pattern I see among firms of one to ten people:

In-scope firms record everything on the business number. Selective recording fails the “intended to result in” test, so blanket capture is the only policy that survives an FCA request to demonstrate compliance.

Article 3 advisers mostly record too. The written-note alternative sounds lighter until you try it: a compliant contemporaneous note of every relevant call, every day, forever - and in a dispute it’s your note against the client’s memory. A recording is cheaper than the discipline notes require.

Intermediaries with no taping obligation increasingly record anyway - because of the Consumer Duty. PRIN 2A requires firms to monitor and evidence the outcomes retail customers receive, and because when a complaint reaches the Financial Ombudsman, “what was the customer told on the phone?” is often the whole case. No rule forced the recording; the recording still wins the argument.

Where does ONSIM fit for small firms?

ONSIM records calls at the network level - the recording happens in the mobile network itself, not in an app on the handset. Nothing to install, nothing for an adviser to remember to press, nothing that breaks with an OS update. Every call on the business SIM or eSIM is captured automatically, stored securely with tamper-evident metadata, and searchable in the dashboard, with retention configurable from six months to seven-plus years. And it does not have to mean new numbers: you can port the mobile numbers your advisers already use to ONSIM - the same process as switching networks - and those existing numbers become recorded, firm-managed lines alongside any landline identities, all on the same system.

For a small firm the commercials are deliberately simple: most SMB customers pay £20/user/month + VAT - SIM, UK minutes and SMS, the recording, archival and search included. The full detail is on our business call recording page, and the regulatory mapping - SYSC 10A, MiFID II Article 16(7), retention, audit trail - is on the FCA call recording compliance page.

If you’re still not sure which side of the line your firm sits on, start with the requirement checker - then confirm the answer with your compliance adviser, because that’s genuinely their call, not ours.

This article is general information, not legal or compliance advice. Scope under SYSC 10A depends on your firm’s permissions and activities - confirm your position with your compliance adviser. Sources: FCA Handbook SYSC 10A; FCA Market Watch 66 (January 2021); FCA Handbook PRIN 2A.

Luke Faragher is the founder of ONSIM, which has run SIM-native business mobile and landline services since 2013. ONSIM is an independent mobile network.