Consultants’ fees reach €7.5m for regulator services

FINANCIAL consultants drafted in to provide additional supervisory services for the Bank Guarantee Scheme received fees totalling €7.5 million.

Invoices submitted to the Irish Financial Services Regulatory Authority show one of the firms, Deloitte and Touche, charged €56,999.99 for 21 days’ work provided by two staff members seconded to the regulatory authority. This means €1,357.14 was charged per day for each worker. Fees were billed under “time charges” of €52,499.99 and “expenses incurred” of €4,500, meaning each of the two staff received expenses of €107 per day.

A second invoice shows accountancy firm Deloitte charged an additional €116,300.57 for secondment services in relation to the Financial Regulator’s review of director’s loans in five institutions. This included VAT of more than €20,000. The total Deloitte bill in respect of three invoices in 2009 and 2010 amounted to €412,399.20.

PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) was the biggest beneficiary receiving fees totalling €5.4m for services provided between November 2008 and March 2010. The biggest PwC bills were fees for professional services for work done in relation to AIB plc, Bank of Ireland Group, Anglo Irish Bank Corporation, Irish Nationwide Building Society, Irish Life and Permanent plc, the Educational Building Society and Jones Lang LaSalle Valuations. These fees amounted to about €2.4m .

Consultants KPMG were paid €1.5m for the secondment of staff to the Office of the Financial Regulator in 2009 and for “assistance on investigations” and “potential ASPs against Anglo Irish Bank”.

Ernst & Young received payments totalling €227,888.38 in relation to the secondment of staff and professional services in 2008 and 2009. Staff were seconded for one monthperiods on four occasions at a cost of €16,667 per month. This was before 21.5% VAT was applied.

The figures were supplied by the Head of Financial Regulation, Matthew Elderfield, to the secretary of the Dáil Public Accounts Committee, at their request. In a letter to the secretary, Mr Elderfield says the invoices are “for advice received in respect of our duties under the Bank Guarantee Scheme and the discharge of other related supervisory duties”. Yesterday a spokesperson for the Office of the Financial Regulator said they would not be elaborating on the content of the invoices other than to say that they were “all in relation to additional supervisory services for the Bank Guarantee Scheme”.