Investment Advice Assessment Tool (IAAT)

Our Investment Advice Assessment Tool (IAAT) helps personal investment firms understand how we assess the suitability of their investment advice and disclosures to consumers. This excludes retirement income or defined benefit transfer advice.

Investment Advice Assessment Tool (IAAT)[1]

We are publishing the IAAT to help firms understand the methodology we use in our file reviews of investment advice. It may also be of interest to other stakeholders with an interest in Investment advice, including:

professional indemnity insurance providers who want to better understand how we assess Investment advice
compliance or legal consultants who want to be better able to support firms responding to our reviews
trustees and sponsoring employers of defined contribution pension schemes

Using the IAAT

Using the IAAT is subject to the terms of our licensing agreement[2].

Please read the agreement carefully before accessing or using the IAAT. By accessing the IAAT you confirm you accept the terms of the IAAT Licence Agreement.

We recommend that you use the current IAAT to assess your past advice. For example, if you receive any complaints about your Investment advice or as part of carrying out a past business review. This IAAT sets out the key factors you should consider when checking the suitability of your advice and disclosure and allows firms to understand what we expect.

Our instruction guide[3] helps you understand how to use the IAAT or interpret the results from a file review by us. You can also email us if you have any questions about how to use the IAAT.

Access the IAAT[1]

Firms can use the updated IAAT to assess the suitability of Investment advice and the adequacy of client disclosure for advice given after 3 January 2018.

Frequently asked questions

How much information should I record in the IAAT?

When completing the template, an assessor should ensure the information entered, including values, notes, additional comments, rationale and evidence, is sufficiently detailed for a third-party assessor to:

get an accurate and complete overview of the relevant evidence on the client file
form a view - without the need to refer to the relevant evidence - on whether the firm has collected the necessary information to assess suitability and complied with any applicable suitability requirements

If a client has more than 5 existing plans, should I complete 2 IAATs?

Yes. In this case, you should complete 1 IAAT for every 5 plans you are advising on.

You can duplicate the information recorded in your first IAAT for this purpose.

Can I assess a personal recommendation as suitable if I have a Material Information Gap?

You cannot assess advice as suitable if there is a Material Information Gap.

In this case, you can only conclude that advice is unsuitable. This is because you do not have the necessary information to assess suitability.

You can find more information on the process in section 1 of the IAAT instructions[3].

Is the IAAT being used to assess compliance with the Consumer Duty before 31 July 2023

No. We will not be using the IAAT to assess compliance with the Consumer Duty[4] before the Duty’s implementation.

What qualifications do I need to use the IAAT?

This is a tool which firms can choose to use when assessing their own Investment advice.

Use of the IAAT is not a requirement, and there are no minimum qualification levels for users.

What qualifications do FCA file reviewers have?

Where we undertake reviews of Investment advice as part of our supervision and enforcement investigations of firms, we use the IAAT. Our assessors, and those responsible for quality assurance, must hold an appropriate level 4 advisory qualification and have appropriate experience.

Where we engage third parties to undertake reviews of Investment advice on our behalf, we expect the same qualification standard to be applied.

First published: 11/06/2025 Last updated: 11/06/2025