The third cross-cutting obligation is to enable retail customers, and support them, in pursuing their financial objectives. What the firm can conclude about those objectives depends on its service: an execution-only or non-advised firm may assume the customer wants to buy the product and get full use and benefit from it, unless it knows otherwise; an advisory or discretionary firm may rely on the objectives the customer disclosed unless it knows or should know they are out of date or inaccurate. Information the firm must collect under other rules (suitability, appropriateness, demands and needs, affordability) is relevant. Supporting customers includes empowering good choices, pointing to alternatives or support where the firm declines a product, and acting on specific objectives the firm becomes aware of, all at the standard of a prudent firm, not beyond it. The cross-cutting obligations apply at every stage of the customer journey, at target market and individual level, and require the firm to understand behavioural biases and vulnerability.
The graph holds this control, the 0 it maps to, and the evidence behind each claim, over MCP and REST.