Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they have any plans to regulate the whole of the high-cost credit sector.

The government transferred the regulation of consumer credit, including high-cost credit and rent-to-own, to the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) in 2014.

The government has given the FCA strong powers to protect consumers, and the government welcomes the ongoing work of the FCA to review the high-cost credit market, including the rent-to-own sector. The FCA published a feedback statement in July 2017, noting concerns in rent-to-own, catalogue credit, home-collected credit, and overdrafts. A policy statement will follow in 2018

The FCA recently announced that BrightHouse, a rent-to-own firm, will pay over £14.8 million in redress to 249,000 customers in respect of agreements which may not have been affordable, and payments which should have been refunded. This demonstrates the effectiveness of FCA regulation in this sector.