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The Money Advice Service is a UK-wide organisation dedicated to helping people manage their money better. It can be contacted via its website www.moneyadviceservice.org.uk or by telephone on 0300 500 5000.
The Money Advice Service’s main functions are:

• leading and co-ordinating a new Financial Capability Strategy for the UK;
  
• providing information and advice to consumers on a wide range of money matters; and
  
• funding and co-ordinating the provision of debt advice
  

The Financial Capability Strategy for the UK aims to help people manage their money better day to day and through major life events, and to deal with periods of financial difficulty.
The Strategy was formally launched on 28 October 2015.The Strategy will be led by a new Financial Capability Board, with the Money Advice Service providing the secretariat.
The Money Advice Service will have a significant role in co-ordinating initiatives across the sector to ensure that consumers are receiving consistent messages, that any gaps in the provision of advice and guidance are filled, and that there is minimal duplication. The Money Advice Service will also lead on gathering evidence and on the evaluation of projects so that a more reliable assessment can be made of ‘what works’ in terms of making tangible improvements to financial capability.^[1]

In line with its statutory function (see below) the Service provides information and advice to consumers across a wide range of money matters. The Money Advice Service is available online at www.moneyadviceservice.org.uk and six days a week by webchat and telephone.^[2] The telephone number for the Service is 0300 500 5000. The Service can also be contacted by email at enquiries@moneyadviceservice.org.uk. The Money Advice Service makes its tools and content freely available to partner organisations for use on their own websites and in other customer communications.^[3]

The Money Advice Service is the largest single funder of debt advice in the UK. In 2015/16 it will – through its partners – aim to deliver 370,000 sessions of free debt advice.
In addition to its funding role, the Money Advice Service has a wider statutory responsibility for the co-ordination of debt advice services – both the free services it funds directly and the wider sector (including fee-charging services). Under the Financial Service Act 2012, the Money Advice Service is responsible for improving the availability, quality and consistency of debt advice.

The Money Advice Service was set up to help tackle low levels of financial capability in the UK. In 2007, the then Economic Secretary to the Treasury, Ed Balls, commissioned the Thoresen Review of Generic Financial Advice (published in March 2008) which found that a national service to provide ‘money guidance’ would be beneficial.
The Financial Services Act 2010 (amending the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000) established the Consumer Financial Education Body (cfeb), which ran a pilot service in the North-East and North-West of England under the brand Moneymadeclear. The Money Advice Service went live as a nationwide service in April 2011.
The Financial Services Act 2012 further amended the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 to incorporate new responsibilities for the Money Advice Service around debt advice.
The Money Advice Service has a single statutory function (“the consumer financial education function”) which is described in legislation as follows:

The consumer financial education function is to enhance—

(a) the understanding and knowledge of members of the public of financial matters (including the UK financial system), and

(b) the ability of members of the public to manage their own financial affairs.

The consumer financial education function includes, in particular—

(a) promoting awareness of the benefits of financial planning;

(b) promoting awareness of the financial advantages and disadvantages in relation to particular decisions relating to different kinds of goods or services;

(c) promoting awareness of the benefits and risks associated with different kinds of financial dealing (which includes informing the FCA and other bodies of those benefits and risks);

(d) the publication of educational materials or the carrying out of other educational activities;

(e) the provision of information and advice to members of the public;

(f) assisting members of the public with the management of debt;

(g) working with other organisations which provide debt services, with a view to improving—

(i) the availability to the public of those services;

(ii) the quality of the services provided;

(iii) consistency in the services available, in the way in which they are provided and in the advice given.”^[4]

The Money Advice Service is funded by two separate levies on the financial services industry – one covering the Service’s debt advice activities, the other for its wider money advice and financial capability initiatives. These levies are collected from firms by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA).
The Service’s total budget in 2015/16 is £81.1 million, comprising £34.1 million for money advice and £47 million for debt advice. The debt advice budget is offset by a voluntary £2 million contribution from firms in the energy and water supply sectors, thereby reducing the debt advice levy to £45 million. A more detailed breakdown is available in the Service’s 2015/16 Business Plan.

The legislation establishing the Money Advice Service included provision for a review of its operation. In May 2014 then Economic Secretary to the Treasury, Andrea Leadsom appointed Christine Farnish to conduct an independent review of the Service. Her report was published by the Treasury on 20 March 2015, containing 25 specific recommendations on how the Money Advice Service could improve.
In particular, it proposed that in light of changes in the advice landscape – and in particular the expansion of online services available to consumers from a variety of sources – the Money Advice Service should reconsider its own website provision and focus on its strategic role, leveraging the impact of other organisations on consumers’ financial behaviour.

In its immediate response to the Farnish Review, the Money Advice Service accepted most of the recommendations made and indicated that these were in alignment with the Service’s existing direction of travel.
For six of the 25 recommendations, however, the Service undertook further analysis. To assist this work, it established a ‘Challenge Panel’ consisting of independent experts. The Service is due to submit its analysis to HM Treasury before the end of 2015.

On 3 August 2015, HM Treasury and the FCA announced a new Financial Advice Market Review (FAMR), to be led by the FCA, with HM Treasury leading on a consultation on the provision of public financial guidance to run alongside. The consultation will look at:

• demand for the public provision of debt, pensions and general money guidance;
  
• how the provision of public financial guidance should be structured and funded; and
  
• how the Government can make the provision of public financial guidance more effective for consumers.