CH232050 - How to do a compliance check: information powers: financial institution notices: introduction
Source: gov.uk (2025-02-13)


This page and chapter are under review as the relevant content is also published in the technical guidance chapters of the Compliance Handbook (https://www.gov.uk/hmrc-internal-manuals/compliance-handbook), within Compliance checks factsheets (https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/hm-revenue-and-customs-compliance-checks-factsheets) and in Compliance checks guidance (https://www.gov.uk/guidance/hmrc-compliance-checks-help-and-support). If you use particular pages regularly, please email xxx@xxx.xx (mailto:xxx@xxx.xx) to let us know the specific content you find useful.

The Financial Institution Notice (FIN) applies from 10 June 2021. CH23110 (https://www.gov.uk/hmrc-internal-manuals/compliance-handbook/ch23110) provides a defintion of what a Financial Institution (FI) is, as it will not always be clear whether the entity is an FI or not. For this reason, you should not currently issue a FIN to an Electronic Money Institution, for example, until the Common Reporting Standard is updated to include them.

FINs apply in relation to most taxes, see CH20150 (https://www.gov.uk/hmrc-internal-manuals/compliance-handbook/ch20150) for a list of these taxes.

The FIN does not require prior agreement from the taxpayer, or tribunal approval, before it can be issued to a Financial Institution.

You must always get approval from an authorised officer before issuing a FIN. This is required by law, see CH23120 (https://www.gov.uk/hmrc-internal-manuals/compliance-handbook/ch23120) and CH260500 (https://www.gov.uk/hmrc-internal-manuals/compliance-handbook/ch260500).

(This content has been withheld because of exemptions in the Freedom of Information Act 2000)

There is no right of appeal for a Financial Institution against a FIN. However, you should be prepared to discuss the notice with the Financial Institution if they have any concerns about complying with the FIN.

If your request might be onerous to comply with, you, along with the authorised officer, may have to consider using a third party notice, potentially with approval from the Tribunal, instead, see CH227000 (https://www.gov.uk/hmrc-internal-manuals/compliance-handbook/ch227000).

Technical Guidance on FINs is at CH23000 (https://www.gov.uk/hmrc-internal-manuals/compliance-handbook/ch23000).

Issuing a FIN

You should not normally make informal requests for information from a Financial Institution.

Before you decide to issue a FIN, see CH232100 (https://www.gov.uk/hmrc-internal-manuals/compliance-handbook/ch232100), you must always get approval from an authorised officer. You should provide a detailed submission to the authorised officer providing the facts and outlining the reasons that the documents are reasonably required and why, in your opinion, the request is not onerous. It is your responsibility to ensure that the authorised officer is aware of all the factors you have considered in deciding to issue a FIN.

The information or documents requested must not be onerous for the Financial Institution to provide or produce, and they must be:
- For the purpose of checking the tax position of a known taxpayer, or
- For the purpose of collecting a tax debt from a known taxpayer, see CH23130 (https://www.gov.uk/hmrc-internal-manuals/compliance-handbook/ch23130).
Additional parties

If the information required relates to an account of the person’s spouse, partner or joint party, or is in joint names, the issue of a taxpayer approved third party information notice to the spouse, partner or joint party should be considered before making an approach to the Financial Institution, see CH207315 (https://www.gov.uk/hmrc-internal-manuals/compliance-handbook/ch207315). If the account is controlled by somebody acting under a Power of Attorney, you should request specialist technical advice from(This content has been withheld because of exemptions in the Freedom of Information Act 2000) (https://www.gov.uk/hmrc-internal-manuals/compliance-handbook/ch910000) .

However, in cases involving an Exchange of Information request from an overseas treaty partner, the option of a taxpayer approved third party information notice is unlikely to be appropriate, so you should normally proceed directly to considering a FIN, see CH232550 (https://www.gov.uk/hmrc-internal-manuals/compliance-handbook/ch232550).