Editorial Standards & Review Process

Who reviews our content

Our content is reviewed by James Carter, a UK mortgage and financial adviser who owns this site, supported by the CarFinanceCalculator.uk editorial team.

James holds CeMAP and DipFA, the two standard UK qualifications for mortgage and financial advice, and he reviews the car finance content on this site. Because he owns the site rather than being engaged to rubber-stamp it, the review role and the accountability for what is published sit with the same person.

The team keeps the calculators' maths correct, keeps the rights and redress content current as the FCA's motor-finance work moves through 2026, and deals with reader corrections. Review is a defined role here rather than an afterthought. A page does not go live until a reviewer other than the original drafter has checked the figures and the sourcing.

Our review process

Every page goes through the same eight steps: source, calculate, draft, fact-check, review, sign-off, publish, and monitor. None gets skipped.

The process is simple on purpose, because we publish across calculators, comparisons, deal explainers, guides and claims pages. The same checks happen whoever is doing the writing.

1. Source. Before a figure is written, we pin down the authority behind it: the FCA, the Consumer Credit Act 1974, a UK court ruling, or MoneyHelper. A claim with no regulator or legislative basis does not get published.
2. Calculate. Every number on a calculator page comes from the published formula and a worked example, so anyone can reproduce it on a spreadsheet.
3. Draft. The page is written in plain English, leading with the figure, with the total amount payable shown next to any monthly payment.
4. Fact-check. A second editor checks every regulated date, rate, percentage and legal reference against the original source, not against another website's summary of it.
5. Review. A reviewer other than the drafter reads the page end-to-end for accuracy, neutrality and clarity, and checks the on-page wording matches any FAQ schema we emit for it.
6. Sign-off. The reviewer sets or confirms the page's `dateModified` and, where the page carries a time-sensitive figure, its visible 'last updated' date.
7. Publish. The page goes live with its provenance byline ('By the CarFinanceCalculator.uk editorial team · Checked against FCA and primary sources') and a link to this page.
8. Monitor. We watch for regulatory changes (FCA policy statements, court judgments) and reader corrections, and re-trigger the fact-check and review steps when the underlying facts move.

The basis for our facts

We rank sources by authority: the law and the regulator first, then official consumer bodies, then nothing else. A lender's marketing material is never our source for a fact about your rights.

When a page states a fact about your rights, whether that is voluntary termination, early settlement or the redress scheme, it traces back to one of these sources rather than a lender's FAQ. We cite the source on the page, and you can check any of them directly with the regulator or on legislation.gov.uk.

• **Financial Conduct Authority (FCA)**: affordability rules, consumer-credit standards, and the motor-finance commission redress scheme running through 2026.
• **Consumer Credit Act 1974**: early settlement and the statutory rebate of interest, voluntary termination at 50%, and the unfair-relationship test in section 140A.
• **UK Supreme Court**: the 1 August 2025 ruling on undisclosed commission in car finance that triggered the FCA's redress work.
• **MoneyHelper**: the government-backed free service we signpost for regulated guidance.
• **Financial Ombudsman Service**: the official route for escalating a complaint about a lender, free to the consumer.

What we check on every page

The same checklist is applied to every page, calculator or guide: numbers first, the true cost always shown, sources cited, no hype, and plain English.

• Numbers first: the answer leads with the figure, then explains it, because this is a calculator site and the numbers are the product.
• True cost shown: every calculator contrasts the monthly payment with the total amount payable, so a cheap-looking monthly cannot hide an expensive total.
• Sources cited: rights, rates and redress facts cite the FCA, the Consumer Credit Act 1974 or the relevant regulator, never a lender's marketing.
• No hype or forbidden words: we do not say 'amazing', 'guaranteed', 'hack', or 'you could be owed £££'. We state facts.
• Plain English: we write for a UK driver who wants to understand the thing, at roughly a Grade 7 to 9 reading level, not for a finance professional who already does.
• Maths is reproducible: any calculator result can be reproduced from the formula on our methodology page.

How often we review

We review the maths on a fixed schedule and the regulatory content whenever the FCA or the courts move it, and we show the date on the page.

The amortisation maths does not change; it has been the same for decades. What changes is the regulatory picture. The FCA's motor-finance commission redress scheme is moving through 2026, the Supreme Court's 1 August 2025 ruling reshaped the commission-disclosure position, and affordability rules shift over time.

Every page carrying a time-sensitive figure, our claims and compensation pages in particular, shows a visible 'last updated' date, and we re-run the fact-check and review steps each time the underlying rule changes. Pages that are purely evergreen maths are reviewed on a recurring schedule against the formula, and their `dateModified` moves only when something actually changes.

Our corrections policy

If we get something wrong, we fix it, update the page's `dateModified`, and, for a material error on a regulated figure, note what changed.

We would rather hear about a mistake and put it right than leave a wrong figure standing. If you spot something that looks stale or incorrect, tell us on our contact page and we will check it against the source. When we correct a material error on a regulated figure, we update the page's modified date so search engines and readers can see it has changed, and we keep the corrected wording in step with any FAQ schema attached to the page.

We do not quietly rewrite history: the visible 'last updated' chip and the structured-data `dateModified` are the honest record of when a page last passed review. Explaining the maths, comparing products and showing the true cost is what we are here for.