Key Information for AR Firms and Professional Advisers
Due to the current Coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak, our offices in Basildon, Milton Keynes and Chilwell have now been closed to staff as well as visitors.
Despite this enforced working from home regime, we will strive to operate a business as usual approach. Business and service disruption should be limited as our key functions continue to operate remotely, as far as possible, so that we can continue to give our AR firms our usual high level of support.
If you wish to contact a member of the Stonebridge team during this period, please do so by telephone and email – not by post.
Operational Advice to Our Member Firms
For the provision of regulated advice, there is no pre-requisite to meet with clients face-to-face. As face-to-face contact with clients has, for now, effectively been prohibited by Government intervention, we are confident that most AR firms are able to move to a phone and email model for a period and continue to operate diligently.
In line with the FCA, we have implemented our contingency arrangements for our Stonebridge offices and have advised our AR firms on how they can adopt these measures themselves. These measures include the following:
• Ensuring staff can operate from home where possible.
• Client access to staff as they are not working from their normal location.
• Technology and security are maintained at non-office locations particularly around data security.
• Overall, continuing to ensure that your business can function even when your staff are not physically ‘at work’.
At Stonebridge, we are fortunate to have a cloud-based infrastructure and the technology in place (primarily through Revolution) to help support our member firms during this unprecedented time.
Advice to Consumers
As a result of our temporary office closures, we will not be receiving and opening physical post sent to the office until further notice. To give the best continuity of service for complaints, please use complaints@stonebridgegroup.co.uk.
Advice to Landlords & Tenants
View the government’s advice to landlord and tenants.
Monitoring and Updates
We will continue to monitor the situation closely and will provide updates on our website should the national position change materially or if Stonebridge services need to alter significantly.
