Adverts from a UK motor finance claims management company (CMC) that used edited, unauthorised clips of consumer champion Martin Lewis and the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) logo to promote headline compensation figures have been banned by the regulator.
Conclusive Financial Ltd, which trades as PCP Refunds, was ordered to remove its advertising and update or take down its website until it complied with FCA rules. The firm has since removed the banned adverts.
The FCA said it was concerned that some of Conclusive’s adverts claimed consumers would receive £1,846 on average in compensation for motor finance claims, without explaining how that figure had been calculated.
The company also promoted a “No Win, No Fee” service on its websites without adequately explaining its charges, including any exit fees. It did not tell consumers that they could pursue motor finance complaints for free directly with their lender or via the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS), without using a CMC.
“Consumers should be wary of adverts that overpromise or give the impression they are endorsed by the FCA or well-known individuals. We will take swift action where rules are being broken," said Alison Walters, director of consumer finance at the FCA. “Our scheme is free and people don’t have to use a CMC or law firm. If they do, it’s important that they can trust them.”
The Conclusive action comes against a backdrop of increasingly robust FCA supervision of financial promotions, with CMCs a particular focus.
In 2024, nearly 20,000 financial promotions were amended or withdrawn following FCA intervention, almost double the level in 2023. Around 9,200 of those changes related to promotions by authorised CMCs, many of them involving housing disrepair and motor finance claims aimed at vulnerable consumers.
The FCA has also created a joint taskforce with the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA), the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) and the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) to tackle poor practice in motor finance claims. By the end of January 2026, regulators had required hundreds of misleading adverts to be removed or amended and enabled tens of thousands of consumers to exit contracts free of charge.
The FCA has disclosed that it has dozens of open investigations into high-volume claims firms, underlining the level of scrutiny on the CMC and mass-claims sector.
That level of supervisory and enforcement activity points to heightened regulatory risk, potential for civil claims where consumers allege mis-selling by CMCs, and a greater need for careful risk selection and pricing.
The marketing crackdown sits alongside the FCA’s flagship intervention in the UK motor finance market. Discretionary commission arrangements (DCAs) – where brokers could vary interest rates to increase their commission – were banned in January 2021, after the FCA concluded they created conflicts of interest and could lead to consumers paying more for car finance.
Following a large-scale review of historic motor finance commission practices, covering data from around 32 million agreements, the FCA identified widespread failures to disclose commission structures and lender–broker relationships adequately.
In March 2026, the FCA confirmed an industry-wide motor finance redress scheme focused on DCAs. Under the scheme, firms are expected to pay several billion pounds in redress, with agreements involving minimal commission or 0% APR typically excluded.
The scheme covers regulated motor finance agreements from April 2007 to November 2024 where commission was paid by lenders to brokers and not properly disclosed. Firms must retain relevant records until at least 2031, creating long-tail exposure for insurers covering lenders, brokers and CMCs.
Although a 2025 Supreme Court ruling reduced some lender exposure on undisclosed commissions, the FCA’s redress scheme and enforcement stance mean the sector still faces substantial compensation and remediation costs, as well as ongoing litigation risk.
This combination of regulatory redress and supervisory activity is likely to translate into increased PI notifications from lenders, brokers, law firms and CMCs linked to motor finance sales and claims handling, and continued pressure on capacity and pricing for UK motor-related PI and wider financial institutions business.
The new taskforce between the FCA, SRA, ASA and ICO is focused on poor practice in motor finance claims, including misleading marketing, excessive or opaque fees, weak or duplicate claims and data-protection issues.
The FCA has also warned about scam activity, including fraudsters posing as lenders or CMCs and contacting motorists about supposed car finance compensation in order to harvest personal data, adding to cyber and fraud exposures.
