Britain's new FCA regulator probes IT failures at RBS

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) announced Tuesday it has launched an investigation into technology failures at the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) last year.

Britain's new financial watchdog said it has started an enforcement proceeding into the computer problems at the state-backed lender that left millions of customers unable to access their accounts in June and July of 2012.

"The FCA will reach its conclusions in due course and will decide whether or not enforcement action should follow that investigation," the regulator said in a statement.

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RBS set aside £125m in August last year to compensate affected customers. It had around 17m customers at the time of the incident but never confirmed the number affected.

Bank of England (BoE) Governor Mervyn King told UK lawmakers last year that the Financial Services Authority (FSA) should look into the glitch.

The FCA and the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) took over from the FSA this month. The so-called new "twin peaks" regulation will cost £646.3m for 2013-14, up 15% from last year's bill for the FSA.

The BoE said the PRA will cost £214.2m on top of the £432.1m that the independent FCA has already proposed.

RD