Roaming

Financial services staff are an itinerant bunch. We should know: so far our users have roamed across 120 countries and 450 networks.

Not all systems can support international roaming. Solutions that rely purely on network controls (SIM-based systems) will not work on every network. In fact 80% of countries have less than 30% of networks that can control routing of calls to enable recording. 40% have no such capabilities at all.

Conference call based systems are also vulnerable to roaming problems, since they also rely on GSM conferencing functionality, which is not available on all networks.

So, where are your staff likely to travel? How important is it from a compliance, governance or risk (GRC) perspectives that all their calls are recorded?

Maintaining current airtime contracts

How much value do you place on the support services you receive from your existing airtime provider?

Unlike SIM-based systems, an application-based service like Cloud Mobile recording, avoids the need to forfeit these—or exit existing contracts or port numbers or unlock phones.

Remote administration

From where will the system be administered? Are all your users in the same location as your IT admin? If you have a dispersed workforce, the ability to remotely set up, activate and deactivate handsets can save time and hassle for administrator and user alike.

User experience

This is, of course, key. Not only try before you buy, ensure you do so on different networks.

Long view

Mobile GRC is a rapidly evolving area and one that also offers broader benefits beyond compliance. Mobility creates value, enhances the services you provide and the way you do business. Like any technology area, selecting a supplier that has the vision and capability to maximize your investments long-term is important.

If you haven’t watched it already, Finextra’s interview with Ovum, Compliant Phones and HP Autonomy last October and the Ovum technology update provides an excellent introduction into how the landscape is likely to evolve.

In the blue-ribbon team event, competition was fierce, with just 13 points between top and bottom. Forming an unlikely transatlantic banking alliance, it was the Chandler-Punchard-Brown-Hawkes quartet who harmonized like the Nolan Sisters to produce an impressive 83 Stableford points (on three-quarter handicaps).

Compliant Phones CEO Curtis Nash with Yoon Park, individual winner of the 2012 London Club Classic

Things were tight in the individuals too. Most on-song were Will Gavin and Yoon Park tying for first place on 37 points. After a tense count-back by Compliant Phones’ own impresario Sunny Simon-Cowell Singh, did the coveted top prize go to Yoon?….yes it did.

There was plenty more on-course singing in the other events but not by the resident professional champion, Chris Weston. If he thought he would have an easy afternoon with the Compliant Phones crowd, he was mistaken.

Get in the the hole!!

Unphased by the 161-yard tee shot over water to an Augusta-like green on the twelfth, no less than six players peppered the pin to Beat the Pro. To quote Bjorge Lillelien: “You boy, took one hell of a beating!”

Well done Steve Burgess, Bob Butcher, Alan Wright, Will Gavin, Steve Brown and our own resident ex pro, Alex Dann.

They say that you drive for show and putt for dough. Not in Nick Oldham’s (NGO Consulting) case, whose astonishing bacon-butty-busting 282-yard thumper split the 18th fairway to earn the coveted longest-drive champagne. Accompanying Samantha in the refreshments buggy, Sunny said that he felt he had been on the longest ever drive, but we think that’s very unfair!

At the eighth, another spectacular across-the-water par three, Phil Haynes from Computertel floated a wonderful five iron to just 12 feet to win Nearest the Pin, snatching glory from runner-up Chris Bannocks of Nomura—who, cruelly, was also runner-up to Tony Court of Cisco in an impromptu Nearest-the-Greenkeeper competition on the fifteenth.

The International Course in excellent condition

Thank you to our friends and co sponsor, Daisy Group, our partners and to all who attended for supporting the event and making this a memorable day and great start to 2012. You heard it from our CEO, Curtis Nash – lots more to come from Compliant Phones of Olympic proportions so watch this space.

See more photos here.

Leading UK wealth management firm, Williams de Broë, needed to meet new Financial Services Authority (FSA) mobile call recording rules. In a business that prides itself on personal service, it was vital they selected a solution that ensured their staff were compliant wherever they roamed without affecting user experience. It also had to be rapidly deployed across multiple offices. They chose Compliant Phones Cloud Mobile recording.

Part of Investec plc, Williams de Broë, is one of the UK’s leading wealth management firms managing over £7 billion assets under management. Headquartered in London, it serves its clients via a national network of regional offices.

In order to comply with FSA mobile call recording rules introduced in November 2011, the firm needed to extend their regulatory recordkeeping to capture mobile voice and text conversations between clients and their investment and relationship managers.

Head of IT, Simon Filby said: “In our business clients should be able to reach us at their convenience, so mobiles are a key tool. Therefore it was important that we met the new regulations without adversely affecting our users’ experience.”

Williams de Broë also wanted a solution that:

• Was reliable and resilient
• Required no user intervention to enable recording
• Would continue to record irrespective of where staff were in the world or on what network they roamed
• Could be deployed remotely across Williams de Broë’s office network
• Avoided the need to change from their preferred airtime provider
• Did not require investment in new or upgraded on-premise recording hardware

Having reviewed the options, the firm selected Compliant Phones’ Cloud Mobile recording solution.

“We worked initially with our air-time provider and also evaluated several alternatives including conference-call based systems, but only Compliant Phones ticked all the boxes.” said Filby.

After a trial at their London HQ, Williams de Broë successfully rolled out mobile recording to all their mobile users in seven different offices.

All calls, voicemails and text messages are now recorded and stored in the Compliant Phones’ secure, ISO27001-accredited Compliant Cloud. Recording can be easily activated and deactivated, and communications searched and played back via a single secure web-based console.

“What has impressed us most is Compliant Phones’ support and expertise. Mobile recording is new technology operating in a deceptively complex environment. Whenever we have required support, highlighted a requirement or development recommendation, they respond quickly and thoughtfully. We have learned a lot as a result.”

About FSA mobile call recording rules

On 14th November 2011, the FSA’s Policy Statement 10/17, “Taping of Mobile Phones” came into force. As a result, firms operating in the capital markets—investment firms including banks, stockbrokers, investment managers, and financial and commodity derivatives firms— must record all transaction-related communications that take place on business-issued mobile phones. Prior to then, only fixed-line voice calls have had to be recorded. Access to voice and electronic records has an important part to play in helping the FSA to both deter and detect abuse, by providing valuable evidence of what they refer to as “knowledge” and “intent” to carry out illegal activities.

Learn more about the rules, including an interview with the FSA, here.
To learn more about Compliant Cloud Mobile recording, visit www.compliantphones.com

Demand for mobile recording has been ignited by new rules from the Financial Services Authority, which came into force on 14th November, requiring traders to record mobile communications. Daisy has also witnessed a growing requirement for this service from other sectors like the public sector and healthcare that record calls for liability protection and service quality assurance purposes.

Daisy undertook thorough research in order to establish a service which could meet its customers’ immediate needs and provide a basis for on-going development.

Terry O’Brien, Mobile Director at Daisy Group plc says: “In what is still a new and evolving technology, it was important that we came to market with a proven, best-of-breed product with the support of a partner with the know-how to ensure we remain at the forefront. Compliant Phones has cemented its leadership in this specialist area, so they were the natural choice.”

He continues: “When the FSA’s new regulations on landline calls came into play we knew that it was only a matter of time before mobile voice and messages were included. This gave us the time to come to market with the best solution for our customers.”

The Daisy Mobile Recording service enables users to record all calls, voicemail and text messages. By using Compliant Phones’ patented Inline Mobile Recording™ technology, users can roam across any network within any country and remain compliant. The recorded communications are stored either in the ‘cloud’ or within the client’s data centre so that they can be searched, played back and managed through a secure web console.

Curtis Nash, CEO at Compliant Phones says: “We are very pleased to be working with Daisy. With 75,000 business customers and a key focus in important verticals, Daisy’s UK market presence makes them an ideal partner to support our global growth.”

So far Daisy has worked with Compliant Phones to deliver mobile recording for 60 banks, brokers and other financial institutions. The partnership will continue to develop the solution to meet the evolving demands of customers.

By Helen Power and Ian Hook

Helen Power reports in The Times that “Big Brother extended his reach over the City’s traders and hedge fund managers yesterday when new rules on phone recording came into force.

“The Financial Services Authority named yesterday as the deadline by which investment banks, stockbrokers, investment mangers and hedge fund managers must ensure that conversations of all their trading staff made on work mobile phones are recorded and kept for at least six months.

“The new rules are intended to close a loophole on insider trading left in 2008 when the FSA introduced compulsory recording of fixed-line telephone conversations in the wake of a surge in unorthodox trades before mergers.Analysis by the regulator showed that at the height of the buyout boom in 2006 and 2007, the announcement of more than 28 per cent of M&A deals were preceded by what the regulator describes as “informed price movement”.

“In 2008 it was not possible to record and store mobile phone conversations on an industrial scale, but by last year the development of new technologies had enabled an extension of existing FSA monitoring rules.

The regulator gave financial institutions a year to put the new policies in practice. “We are extending the taping rules so firms record and keep copies of all relevant conversations made on mobile phones provided to individuals by firms,” the regulator told the City last year.

Power went on to say: The FSA does not disclose how many conversations from fixed-line phone recording it asks for each year. But some of its biggest enforcement successes have come from information gained by phone taping.”

To read the full article visit: http://www.thetimes.co.uk/

By Jim Ottewill, Bobsguide

Telephone calls and electronic messages have been the focus of scrutiny from the Financial Services Authority (FSA) since March 2009 – but these regulations are now due to see a significant change.

The FSA’s phone recording rules will be updated on Monday 14 November to include all interactions conducted on mobile, which was exempt from the original legislation. At the time, the FSA felt that the technology required to monitor the calls of executives was not yet advanced enough to support the myriad banks in the sector.

However, last year after a consultation period, the FSA decided to reconsider its original decision. Technology was thought to be up to speed while the regulator was also under extra pressure to prevent market abuse following the financial crash in 2008.

Ian Hook, vice-president of Marketing at Compliant Phones, an IT vendor specialising working with banks to help them comply with the changes, said that the 14 November update is an indication of how the march of technology is shaping the corporate world.

“Although trading is still largely dealer-based because of the desk boards and the compliance systems which support it, the reality is that behaviours are changing very rapidly due to the power of smartphones and mobile technology,” he explained.

“Traders no longer have to work from their desk and providing they are compliant, which is where the recording comes in, they can now work anywhere.”

Despite the deadline, recent research published by Orange Business UK, suggested that many financial firms are unaware of what they need to do to comply with the regulation.

The report showed that only 16 per cent of respondents were aware of the regulation and when it comes into effect. Nearly a third of participants confessed to having no knowledge at all of the FSA’s intentions.

Curtis Nash, chief executive officer (CEO) at Compliant Phones, said there has been a great reluctance within the industry to embrace the incoming legislation.

“None of the traders have wanted to have all their calls recorded with many of them resisting as long as they can. Now many of them have left it too late.”

So with many organisations either unaware of what the regulations mean or still looking to implement the changes to monitoring practices, banks and technology vendors face numerous challenges to comply. Ian Hook highlighted the key issues;

• All calls regardless of network or location need to be recorded

Hook said: “A trader can be regulated by the FSA but when working abroad in another office and using the phone, they are still under the FSA’s jurisdiction. These calls still need to be captured and stored.”

• The integrity of every recording needs to be guaranteed

“The mobile recording space is littered with legacy services which have evolved with different types of technology. In the past organisations were able to record voice onto your handset. Some organisations have used that and tried (unsuccessfully) to apply it to the legislation.”

• All relevant interactions on a handset need to be captured

Nash said: “FSA regulation says all relevant conversations need to be captured. So if the company allows Facebook or Twitter we need to record it. The legislation refers to all interactions happening on the handset.”

• Data management

Hook: “Once you’ve captured the data, you need to be able to use it in a meaningful way. From a compliance perspective this means being able to search through the data for relevant streams and get that information in good prompt time either to support the regulator or to support your internal governance.”

To view the article click here.

This blog first appeared in Financial Technologies Forum

Global regulators align around FSA mobile call recording regulation

This Monday (14th November), an important regulatory and operational milestone for firms operating in the capital markets will be reached in the UK. The Financial Services Authority (FSA) finally mandates the recording of transaction-related communications to and from staff mobiles.

Despite criticism from banks that the regulation is an unnecessary burden that requires the deployment of relatively immature technology, the FSA has been steadfast in their resolve. Other key financial centres are now following suit, most notably the US.

Under direction from the Dodd Frank Regulatory Reform Bill passed by the Senate last year, the Commodities Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and the Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) will introduce voice record-keeping rules next year. Initially targeted at swap, commodities and derivatives dealers, it’s a safe bet to assume these will extend to equity markets.

Closer to home, last month’s publication of MiFID II’s proposed wording—the latest version of the Market in Financial Instruments Directive and in many ways Europe’s answer to Dodd-Frank—confirmed the European Commission’s intention to mandate voice and electronic record keeping across all member states.

With recording here to stay, the question on everyone’s lips now is: how easy will it be to work and manage? In the absence of wires to which to connect, mobile recording is deceptively complex. As a result, a lot of attention has been focused on how to capture mobile calls (and voicemail and text) reliably wherever a user happens to be and without impinging on their communication experience.

This is only half the battle. In an age of heavy-touch regulatory supervision and increasingly damaging persistent rogue trading, the ability to store, find and manage the additional data stream efficiently and responsively is becoming a business-critical requirement—particularly given five and three-year minimum retention periods being proposed by the US and the EU.

But in regulated markets, it is invariably the supervisors that control the pace of innovation. Arguments over regulatory necessity will soon fade away to be replaced by talk of business benefits in this fast developing technology area.

Investment banking has, until now, been a desk-based pursuit. Freed from the shackles of the office, compliant mobile working offers significant benefits, particularly given the 24×7 global nature of investment banking.

In addition, other derived benefits are emerging. For example, this has offered many firms the catalyst they need to adopt secure cloud-based recording, archive and analytics systems that can transform the cost and flexibility of IT infrastructure at a time when their businesses are finding it harder than ever to deliver top-line growth.

Yet, as any CIO knows, picking technology winners can be no different to picking stocks. Looking at fundamentals, taking a long view, protecting your short-term position—the same principles often apply. And in a febrile, fast-changing market, this can be just as challenging. The overall message to the financial services community is clear – take mobile recording seriously and do not cut corners.

View the blog on Financial Technologies Forum

The five world-leading investment banks chose Compliant Phones’ cloud-based mobile recording solution following extensive product and security evaluation. The technology – underpinned by Compliant Phones’ patented Inline Mobile RecordingTM – performed well under scrutiny to ensure full recording compliance was achieved.

The UK financial services community has less than a month to implement fully-compliant recording technology in a crowded market where not all solutions can guarantee to cover the new FSA regulations.

Curtis Nash, Compliant Phones’ CEO, commented: “In a compliance-driven market where a significant proportion of banks are opting for the lowest common denominator option, today’s deals highlight that our solution is reliable, strategic and strongly endorsed globally. In such a tight economic climate, investment banks should be reassured that our technology will fully support FSA compliance guidelines.”

By Jim Ottewill, www.bobsguide.com

Cloud computing is an important innovation which can help financial firms comply with new regulations surrounding the storage of mobile conversations, an IT vendor has said.

New regulations from the Financial Services Authority (FSA) mean organisations working in the financial services sector will need to retain more data surrounding trader interactions and for longer periods of time.

According to a report by Ovum, the data retention period could increase from six months to three years, which it said raises questions surrounding data storage and the ability to retrieve this information in a “timely and meaningful way”.

Curtis Nash, chief executive officer (CEO) at Compliant Phones, said that many market participants do not want the hassle of having to manufacture storage facilities to retain this additional data on site.

“There’s a great big capital cost having a box recording downstairs. So why wouldn’t you use the cloud? In the past the problem with cloud has been security but now technology has moved on and there is now much more of an acceptance. But if you’d try to do this two or three years ago, the majority of banks would have not accepted it.”

He said that the importance of effective record management solutions will grow as companies realise that they need to analyse the data rather than just capture the information.

Other incoming regulation on both sides of the Atlantic is also expected to place more emphasis on the collection of data by firms working within the financial services industry.

Nash also said that MIFID II is important from a record keeping perspective. It is expected to prescribe that all European territories should have both voice and electronic records of conversations as part of measures to increase both data transparency and standardisation.

“Similar rules pertaining to record keeping by swap dealers are included in the forthcoming Dodd-Frank act. It shows how the globalisation of consistent record keeping and including voice and all electronic media is now really pushing out and accelerating,” he explained.

However, a recent study by Vanson Bourne and commissioned by Orange Business UK revealed how many of the UK’s financial firms are not prepared for the new legislation surrounding mobile.

Nearly a third of senior IT decision-makers at financial companies were unaware of the forthcoming changes to existing rules. Additionally, 38 per cent were aware that the FSA was planning on making amendments to existing legislation but did not know the anticipated date of implementation.

The Financial Services Authority (FSA), has mandated that participants in the UK’s capital markets must record all conversations of those employees involved in trading by 14 November 2011.

By Nicholas Donato, www.privateequitymanager.com

UK financial services firms have just three weeks left to put in place policies designed to record employees’ mobile phone conversations with clients.

UK-based private equity firms and other financial institutions have until 14 November, or three weeks from Monday, to implement internal policies and procedures to tape employees’ relevant mobile phone conversations.

Firms are required to preserve all recordings for a minimum six month period.

A number of private equity firms have been putting off compliance with the rule, miscalculating the amount of time needed to upgrade mobile phones or systems for recordings, said Ryan Shuttleworth, the chief technology officer of Compliant Phones – an independent mobile and voice recording company which received a £2 million capital injection from UK private equity house Oxford Capital Partners last June.

Depending on the size of a firm, compliance can take anywhere between weeks to months, reckons Shuttleworth, and “some firms now have only just entered the testing phase.”

UK firms have been recording telephone calls and other electronic messages since March 2009, but mobile phone conversations were left exempt from the Financial Services Authority’s “taping rules” due to gaps in technology. However recent improvements in recording devices and the desire to circumvent market abuses prompted the UK regulator to reconsider mobile phones from exemption.

Mobile phones issued by firms for business use would be bound by the rule when employees conduct calls about transactions in quoted instruments. Due to data privacy laws, personal mobile phones would not be recorded, but firms must take “reasonable steps” to ensure employees do not use their private phones to make business calls as a way of working around the regulation.

During a consultation period trade bodies such as the British Private Equity and Venture Capital Association argued “reasonable steps” was too vague in determining what was expected of firms.

The FSA responded that its “fundamental position is that each firm must determine what is right for their individual business” in preventing employees from using personal phones to conduct unrecorded business calls.

The FSA suggested that at a minimum firms would “ensure their employees are made aware of their responsibilities… for example through adequate compliance training”, and that “proper paper or order trails to be in place so firms are alerted to any ‘relevant conversations’ that have occurred off taped lines”.