New Financial Consumer Relations Department at Central Bank 

A new Financial Consumer Relations Department (FCRD) has been established at the Central Bank (CB) with effect from August 10 to serve as the single point of contact to handle all external complaints and grievances directed to the CB on entities regulated by the banking regulator under the provisions of Section 33 of the Monetary Law Act No. 58 of 1949, as amended. 

“Addressing complaints and grievances of financial consumers is an objective of financial market regulation and long term financial system stability. With the increasing competition amongst Financial Service Providers (FSPs) in providing financial services, the need arises for a suitable mechanism to safeguard the interests of the users of financial services and thereby to safeguard the stability and integrity of the financial system. Recent reports on financial consumer experience in the Sri Lankan financial markets show that even the most financially literate consumers have become victims to inappropriate market conduct by some FSPs regulated by CB as well as Informal Financial Service Providers (IFSPs),” the CB said in a media release.
 
Initially, the FCRD will focus on financial consumer complaints and grievances on FSPs regulated by the CB. 

At a later stage, it is expected to expand the scope to cover areas such as monitoring of market conduct, consumer empowerment, financial consumer education, monitoring of unfair competition among FSPs. The ultimate objective of this initiative is to establish an independent authority to safeguard the rights of consumers and investors in the financial industry in Sri Lanka, it said. (BS)