Dive deeper into our FCA courses
See what’s included in our FCA course library below. Looking for something specific? Use the search bar to find what you need. If you have any questions, reach out and tell us more about your requirements — we’re happy to help.
SM&CR in Practice
Most SMCR problems are not caused by bad intent. They happen because a responsibility was never formally allocated, a handover note was thin, or oversight of delegated work left no trail. Built as a working reference rather than a one-off tick, it answers the question the FCA asks: how does a firm know its senior population understands what it owns?
CeMAP Competency Refresher Training
Adviser knowledge drifts quietly. Rules change, products change, and the gap only becomes visible when a file review or a complaint exposes it. Running this refresher across your advice population gives you a dated, reportable record that competence has been maintained, which is exactly the evidence the FCA looks for when testing whether a firm supervises its advisers properly.
Conduct Rules for Senior Managers at Dual Regulated Firms
Reasonable steps is the phrase that decides enforcement outcomes, and it is judged after the event. Senior managers who can point to training, records and considered decisions sit in a very different position from those relying on recollection. This course puts the ten rules in front of the people held personally accountable for them.
Conduct Rules for Senior Managers at FCA Solo Firms
Smaller solo-regulated firms often have senior managers wearing several hats, and that is precisely where accountability gets blurred. This course makes the boundaries explicit and shows what taking reasonable steps actually looks like when resources are stretched, which gives your compliance programme a clean, evidenced starting point for the annual fitness and propriety cycle rather than an assertion nobody can support.
FX Global Code Compliance Training Course
Adherence to the Code is voluntary in form but expected in practice, and counterparties increasingly ask about it. A Statement of Commitment carries little weight if the people executing trades cannot describe the principles behind it. Training the desk and the functions around it turns a published commitment into something your firm can actually demonstrate when a counterparty or supervisor asks.
Outsourcing and Third Party Risk Management Online Course
Outsourcing transfers activity, never responsibility. When a supplier fails, the regulator looks at the firm that appointed them. This course gives procurement, operations and compliance a shared vocabulary for assessing arrangements before they are signed, which is a far cheaper place to find a problem than a post-incident review, and it makes supplier oversight something the business does rather than something it documents.
Responsible Lending and Affordability Training Course
Affordability failures surface years later, usually when a borrower is already in difficulty and the file has to defend itself. Redress in this area is expensive and public. Putting your lending and advice teams through structured training on the rules protects the customer outcome the FCA is measuring, and gives you a defensible record of the standard you set.
UK Money Markets Code Online Training Course
Market codes work only when the people on the desk know them. Signing up to the Code is a public statement, and supervisors reasonably expect firms to back it with training rather than intent. Including this course in your annual programme gives you evidence of adherence, and gives staff a clear reference point when a transaction sits in a grey area.
Operational Resilience
Resilience regulation shifted the question from whether a firm can prevent disruption to whether it can keep serving customers during one. That needs more than the business continuity plan already sitting on the shared drive. Training staff on impact tolerances and service mapping is what turns a board-level commitment into something your operational teams can actually execute under pressure.
CASS 7 and 7A Client Money Rules and Client Money Distribution Training Course
CASS is one of the few areas where the FCA has consistently imposed substantial penalties on firms that were otherwise well run. Breaches are usually procedural: a reconciliation missed, an acknowledgement letter never obtained. Training everyone whose work touches client money, not only the CASS oversight officer, is the most reliable way to keep those procedural gaps from opening.
Conduct Risk
Conduct risk is easy to state and hard to operationalise. Teams that never handle a customer directly still shape the outcome, through pricing, process design, service levels and the way exceptions get handled. Extending this training beyond customer-facing roles is what stops conduct risk being treated as a front-office concern, and it strengthens the outcomes evidence your firm reports upward.
Introduction to UK Financial Regulation
NEDs sit at a distance from daily operations, which is exactly why their accountability is so often misunderstood inside the firm. The regulator holds them to a higher standard, not a lighter one. Bringing your board and committee members through structured training closes a gap most compliance programmes leave open, and it is straightforward evidence of governance quality when supervisors ask.
Information Barriers
Wall crossings, restricted lists and need-to-know handling only work if staff recognise which side of the barrier they are on. Failures here feed straight into market abuse and conflicts of interest exposure, both of which attract personal liability. Training staff across the private and public side gives your firm a consistent standard and supports the surveillance and record keeping already in place.
Benchmarks Regulation Training Course
Benchmark manipulation produced some of the largest fines and the most damaging headlines the sector has seen, and the rules that followed are unforgiving. Contribution, administration and use of benchmarks each carry obligations. Training the staff involved protects against a category of failure that is rarely accidental but is often enabled by people who did not understand the rules they were working around.
MCOB - Advertising and Selling Compliance Training Course
The line between advice and information is where a large share of mortgage complaints originate, and it is easy to cross in conversation without noticing. Documented training on that distinction protects the adviser as much as the customer. It also strengthens the file quality your firm relies on when a case is reviewed years after the sale.
Prudential Regulation Training Course for Financial Services Staff
Prudential requirements are usually treated as a finance and treasury concern, which leaves everyone else unable to see how their decisions affect capital, liquidity or the firm's regulatory position. Broadening that understanding improves the quality of information reaching the people who do own it. It also supports SM&CR expectations that staff understand the regulatory environment they operate in.
Developing Secure Applications
For FCA-regulated firms, technology failures are a conduct and operational resilience issue, not just an IT one, and the regulator has been explicit about board accountability for it. Development practice is where a large share of that exposure originates. Training your engineers gives you a demonstrable control at the point where risk is introduced rather than at the point where it is discovered.
Complaints Handling FCA Compliance
The FCA reads complaints data as a conduct indicator, and the way a complaint is handled often matters more than the issue that caused it. Cases usually escalate because nobody logged them as complaints in the first place. Training all staff who have customer contact protects your Ombudsman referral rates and improves the root cause information your firm reports.
Treating Customers Fairly FCA Compliance
Fairness is assessed on outcomes, not intentions, and outcomes are shaped in places the customer never sees: product design, pricing, service levels and how exceptions are handled. Extending this training beyond customer-facing teams is what makes TCF operational. It also gives your firm better evidence when demonstrating fair treatment across the full product and service lifecycle.
MCOB - General Standards
Firms frequently underestimate how far MCOB reaches into marketing, administration and servicing rather than sitting only with advisers. That misreading is where breaches begin. Covering the full population that touches home finance activity gives your compliance programme consistent standards across the customer journey, and removes the gap between what your advisers are trained on and what everyone else assumes applies to them.
Ethical Standards in Insurance and Investment Compliance E-Learning
Reputation is the asset a financial firm cannot rebuild quickly, and it is usually damaged by an individual rather than a system. Standards here are enforced through the regulator, professional bodies and the employment contract at the same time. Making the expectations explicit protects your people as much as the firm, and gives managers a clear basis for the conversations that prevent escalation.
CONC - Consumer Credit Regulations
Consumer credit attracts sustained FCA attention because the customers affected are often the least able to absorb a poor outcome. Promotions and pre-contract disclosure are where most enforcement starts. Training staff across marketing, sales and collections rather than compliance alone puts the rules in front of the people who create the risk, well before a financial promotion goes live.
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Markets in Financial Instruments Directive II (MiFID II)
MiFID II obligations spread through the business in ways that surprise firms: research payments, call recording, best execution, target market assessment and reporting all sit in different teams. Treating it as a front-office matter leaves the operational obligations unowned. A shared understanding across functions is what makes the regime workable rather than a permanent source of remediation projects.
Complaints Handling for the Mortgage Market Course
Mortgage complaints carry unusual weight because the sums are large, the relationship is long, and the customer is often already in difficulty. Handling one badly turns a service problem into an Ombudsman case with costs and publicity attached. Training everyone who speaks to borrowers, not only the complaints team, is what keeps issues resolvable at first contact.
MCOB - Equity Release
Equity release customers are frequently older, sometimes vulnerable, and rarely able to reverse a decision that turns out badly. The FCA has reviewed suitability in this market more than once and found file quality wanting. Structured training on product differences and suitability evidence protects the customer outcome and gives your firm files that stand up when they are examined years later.
Pensions Ombudsman Complaints Handling
Pension complaints often concern decisions taken years earlier by people who have long since left, which makes the internal record the only defence available. Ombudsman determinations are published. Equipping administration and member-facing teams to handle disputes properly at the internal stage reduces referrals and improves the quality of the documentation your scheme relies on.
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Treating Customers Fairly [Mutual]
Mutuals are owned by their members, which raises expectations rather than lowering them. Fairness is assumed by members and tested by the regulator, and the two do not always look at the same evidence. This course gives staff a practical test they can apply to their own decisions, supporting both the member relationship and the outcomes evidence your board reviews.
CASS Overview
CASS breaches have produced some of the FCA's most substantial penalties against otherwise well-run firms, usually through procedural failures rather than misconduct. Staff who never touch a reconciliation still make decisions that affect client asset protection. An organisation-wide overview establishes why the rules are strict, which is what stops a well-intentioned shortcut becoming a reportable breach.
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Whistleblowing for Managers (FS)
Whistleblowing regimes fail at the first conversation. A manager who reacts defensively closes the channel for everyone who hears about it afterwards. The FCA expects senior managers to champion the arrangements, not merely permit them, and detriment claims are personally damaging. Training managers on the response, not just the policy, is what makes the channel usable.
Complaints Handling for Managers
Complaint handling quality is a management outcome. Where teams are under-resourced or discouraged from logging issues, the data the firm reports upward stops reflecting reality and root cause analysis becomes worthless. Training managers on their specific oversight duties gives your complaints function the support it needs, and gives the firm complaints data it can actually rely on.
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Understanding Failure to Prevent Fraud (FTPF) in Financial Services for Managers
Financial services firms act through a wide network of employees, appointed representatives, introducers and outsourced providers, and the offence follows that reach. Managers who oversee those relationships are the control point. Training them properly is how a firm turns a policy statement into the reasonable procedures defence, which is the only protection available once a fraud has already occurred.
Good Outcomes for Vulnerable Customers
Vulnerability is often temporary and rarely announced. Bereavement, illness, redundancy and financial pressure all create it, and the customer may not use the word. The Consumer Duty makes outcomes for customers with characteristics of vulnerability a supervisory priority, so the ability of front-line staff to notice and adapt is now directly measurable.
Overview of the Consumer Duty
The Duty asks firms to prove outcomes rather than demonstrate process, which is a genuine change in how compliance has to be evidenced. Staff in product, pricing, operations and service all affect the result. Making the Duty understood across the business is what turns board-level attestation into something the firm can actually substantiate when the FCA asks for the data behind it.
Conflicts of Interest in Asset Management
Asset management conflicts are structural rather than occasional: allocation between funds, dealing commission, cross trades, personal account dealing and fee structures all create them. The FCA has reviewed this area repeatedly and found frameworks that exist without functioning. Training investment, dealing and support staff to recognise conflicts in their own decisions is what gives the framework something real to control.
Training and Competence
T&C failings usually surface as advice failings years later, when the supervision records are the only evidence available. Competence is not a state a firm reaches once. Making the regime understood by staff as well as supervisors improves the quality of the records your firm keeps, and supports the fitness and propriety assessments that sit alongside them under SM&CR.
Overview of SM&CR for FCA Solo Firms
SM&CR is often treated as something that concerns only the senior population, but the Conduct Rules reach almost everyone and the certification regime affects hiring, appraisal and reference practice. Staff who understand the structure make fewer mistakes in the processes that support it, and the firm gets cleaner evidence when annual certification comes around.
MCOB - APRC, Shortfalls and Charges
Errors in APRC calculation or disclosure affect every promotion issued while the error persists, which makes remediation costly and highly visible. The assumptions behind the figure are where mistakes are made. Training the marketing, product and compliance staff who produce and approve promotions catches those errors before publication rather than after a supervisory review.
Overview of SM&CR for Dual Regulated Firms
Dual regulation means two supervisors with overlapping but distinct expectations, and the SM&CR obligations are correspondingly heavier. Staff who understand how the regime is structured support it far better through the hiring, reference and certification processes that carry the administrative load. That understanding is also what keeps the firm's responsibilities map accurate between formal reviews.
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Conduct Rules for Non-Executive Directors (NEDs)
NEDs are held to a higher standard of accountability precisely because they are expected to challenge. That is difficult to do well without a clear view of what the regulator expects of the role. Including your board and committee members in the compliance programme closes a gap most firms leave open, and it is straightforward evidence of governance quality.
CASS 6 - Custody Rules
Custody failures are usually discovered during a CASS audit rather than by the firm, and by then the breach may have persisted for months. Records and reconciliations are where the rules bite hardest. Training operations staff on why the requirements are so prescriptive reduces the number of qualifications in your CASS audit report and shortens the remediation that follows.
CASS 8 - Mandates
Mandates are the CASS area most often missed entirely, because a firm can hold one without ever holding client money. Direct debit authorities and standing instructions can create them. Firms usually find out during an audit. Training the staff who set up and manage these arrangements is how you identify mandates before someone else does.
MCOB - Disclosures
Disclosure failures are systematic rather than individual: once a template or a process step is wrong, every customer through it is affected. That makes remediation expensive and highly visible to the FCA. Training the staff who design journeys and produce documentation alongside those who deliver them catches problems at the point where fixing them costs one change rather than thousands.
MCOB - Financial Promotions
Most promotion breaches happen because someone did not recognise that what they produced was a financial promotion at all. Social posts, email footers and conversations at events all qualify under the right conditions. Training marketing, sales and broker-facing teams on the categories is the difference between a compliant approval process and one that only sees the material somebody remembered to submit.
Mortgage Credit Directive
The MCD brought second-charge and consumer buy-to-let lending into a framework many firms had not previously worked within, and the differences between the categories are easy to lose in practice. Applying the wrong process to the wrong product creates a documentation failure across a whole book. Training staff on where each regime applies protects file quality and reduces remediation risk.
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Packaged Retail and Insurance-based Investment Products (PRIIPs) Regulation
Key information documents are prescriptive by design, which means judgement calls in risk indicators, cost figures and performance scenarios are the main source of error. Every investor who received a flawed document is affected. Training the product, marketing and oversight staff involved keeps errors out of the population rather than requiring them to be corrected across it.
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Sustainability Disclosure Requirements (SDR) and Investment Labels
The anti-greenwashing rule applies to all FCA-authorised firms, not only those using a label, and it catches any sustainability claim made to clients. That reaches marketing copy, fund factsheets and conversations. Training staff on what a claim now has to be able to support protects your firm from an exposure that sits in ordinary customer communication rather than in formal disclosure.
UCITS
UCITS is a retail investor protection regime as much as a distribution passport, and depositary oversight and delegation are where firms most often fall short. Operational teams manage these arrangements day to day without always seeing the investor protection logic behind them. Making that logic clear improves oversight quality and supports the governance evidence a management company needs to produce.
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Understanding Failure to Prevent Fraud (FTPF) in Financial Services
Failure to Prevent Fraud (FTPF) is a corporate offence that holds organisations criminally liable if they do not have reasonable measures in place to stop fraud committed by someone acting on their behalf. Our Understanding Failure to Prevent Fraud Course explains how the offence works, what types of fraud are covered, and what steps our Company and employees must take to help prevent it. The course will help employees understand their role in protecting the organisation from liability and reputational harm.
CASS 15 - Payment Services and Electronic Money: Relevant Funds
Payments and e-money firms have grown quickly, often without the client asset governance long established in traditional financial services, and failures have left customers waiting years for their money. The new requirements are prescriptive and audited. Training operations, finance and compliance staff together is what turns a safeguarding policy into daily practice that will survive an audit.
Meeting the Conduct Rules in FCA Solo Regulated Firms
Almost everyone at a solo-regulated firm is subject to the Individual Conduct Rules, including staff who never see a customer. Breaches are reportable to the FCA and follow individuals between employers through regulatory references. Training the whole population is a regulatory requirement in substance as well as good practice, and it gives the firm clean evidence that people were told what applies to them.
Meeting the Conduct Rules in Dual Regulated Firms
Dual-regulated firms answer to both the FCA and the PRA, so the conduct expectations arrive from two directions and the population caught by them is large. Breach reporting obligations apply regardless of seniority. Making the rules understood across the firm reduces reportable breaches and gives your certification and reference processes something solid to rest on.
Personal Conflicts of Interest
Personal conflicts are the hardest category to control because nobody else can see them. Outside directorships, family relationships with suppliers, personal account dealing and second jobs all qualify, and each feels private until it becomes a regulatory matter. Making disclosure routine rather than exceptional keeps your conflicts register useful and protects individuals from a situation that looks far worse undeclared.
BCOBS - General Standards
Communication standards under BCOBS interact directly with the Consumer Duty's requirement that customers understand what they are being told, so the two are increasingly tested together. Errors reach every customer receiving a given communication. Training the staff who write, approve and deliver customer messaging is where the risk is created and where it is cheapest to control.
Payment Services Regulations
The PSRs set hard timeframes for executing payments, handling complaints and refunding unauthorised transactions, and the burden of proof frequently sits with the provider. Open banking added participants who had not operated under these rules before. Training operations and customer-facing staff on the specifics protects your firm from liability that attaches automatically when a deadline passes.
Senior Management Arrangements Systems and Controls
SYSC is the layer beneath SM&CR, operational resilience and financial crime controls, and weaknesses here surface as failures elsewhere. Managers frequently work within the arrangements without ever seeing the framework that produced them. Training them on the structure itself makes responsibility allocation more deliberate, which is exactly what supervisors examine when something has gone wrong.
AIFM Regulations
Marketing restrictions are where firms most often step wrong, because a conversation with a potential investor can constitute marketing before anyone intended it to. Depositary, remuneration and reporting obligations add further weight. Training investment, distribution and operations staff on the boundaries protects the manager's regulatory position in a regime where breaches are visible to investors as well as supervisors.
Breathing Space Regulations
Continuing to pursue a debt after a moratorium starts is a breach with consequences, and the notification can arrive at any point in a collections process. Front-line collections staff make the decisions that trigger it. Training them properly protects customers who are already in difficulty and protects the firm from a failure that is easy to make and impossible to argue away.
CASS 10 - CASS Resolution Pack
The pack is only useful if documents can be retrieved within the required timeframe, which is a test firms rarely run until an audit forces it. Contents drift as systems and counterparties change. Training the staff who own the underlying documents keeps the pack accurate, and turns a compliance artefact into something that would actually work in the situation it was designed for.
CASS 9 - Information to Clients
Client reporting obligations are easy to under-deliver, because nobody complains about information they did not know they were entitled to until something goes wrong. The requirements are specific about content and frequency. Training operations and client service staff on what is owed keeps your firm on the right side of a rule that is straightforward to comply with and awkward to explain having missed.
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Swap Execution Facilities (SEFs) and Designated Contract Markets (DCMs)
Venue rulebooks differ, and a trader working across several of them is working to several sets of obligations at once. Breaches attract attention from US regulators regardless of where the desk sits. Training the staff who execute and support these trades keeps your firm on the right side of a regime that assumes participants have read the rulebook of every venue they touch.
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BCOBS - General Standards [Mutual]
Mutuals are owned by their members, which raises the expectation that communication is clear and the relationship is fair, and members notice when it is not. BCOBS standards now interact directly with the Consumer Duty's understanding requirement. Training the staff who produce and deliver customer messaging protects both the regulatory position and the member relationship the organisation depends on.
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Payment Services Regulations [Mutual]
The PSRs set firm deadlines for executing payments, resolving complaints and refunding unauthorised transactions, with the burden of proof frequently resting on the provider. Members expect their society to get this right without being asked. Training operations and front-line staff on the specifics prevents liability that attaches automatically once a timeframe passes.
Financial Crime Prevention
Financial crime controls fail at the point where something looks slightly wrong to someone who is not certain it is their place to ask. Specialist teams see what is escalated to them and nothing else. Building baseline awareness across the whole workforce widens the detection surface, which is worth more than another automated rule in the transaction monitoring system.
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Senior Management Arrangements Systems and Controls [Mutual]
Mutuals often run with smaller management teams where individuals hold several responsibilities at once, which is exactly where allocation becomes unclear. SYSC sits beneath SM&CR and the wider control framework, so weaknesses here appear as problems elsewhere. Making the framework understood produces deliberate allocation rather than assumptions that only get tested during a supervisory visit.
Short Selling Regulations
Notification thresholds are calculated positions rather than single trades, so the obligation can be triggered by activity spread across desks and entities. Errors in methodology produce either a missed disclosure or a public one that was never required. Training the staff who calculate and report positions protects the firm from a category of breach that is visible to the whole market.
Principles for Businesses
The Principles are the FCA's most flexible enforcement tool, and firms are disciplined under them where no specific rule was broken. Principle 12 and the Consumer Duty added to that reach. Staff who understand the Principles can judge situations the rulebook does not cover, which is precisely where regulatory judgement is needed and most often absent.
COBS - Client Communications and Financial Promotions
Financial promotion breaches affect every recipient of the material, which makes them expensive to remediate and highly visible. Performance presentation is where firms most often overstep, usually through selective periods or unclear assumptions. Training the marketing, product and approval staff who produce this material catches errors before publication rather than after a supervisory review or a customer complaint.
COBS - Client Categorisation
Categorisation determines what the firm owes a client across the whole relationship, so an error at onboarding propagates through everything that follows. Elective professional classifications need documented assessment that frequently turns out to be thin. Training onboarding and client-facing staff protects the client's protections and keeps your files defensible when a relationship later goes wrong.
COBS - Dealing and Managing
Aggregation and allocation are where conflicts between clients become concrete, and the FCA has found allocation practice wanting in successive reviews. Best execution is also frequently treated as a policy document rather than a tested obligation. Training dealing and investment staff on the requirements keeps practice aligned with policy, which is exactly the gap supervisors look for.
FSCS Deposit Protection
Customers make deposit decisions based on what front-line staff tell them about protection, and an inaccurate answer about limits or eligibility can cost someone their money. Temporary high balance rules are widely misunderstood. Training customer-facing staff properly protects depositors and keeps the firm's required disclosures accurate, which matters most at exactly the moment nobody has time to check.
Fit and Proper Assessments
Fit and proper assessment is an annual obligation for certified staff, not a one-off hurdle at appointment, and the records supporting it are examined during supervisory work. Non-financial misconduct now features explicitly in how the FCA approaches it. Making the criteria clear to the population being assessed produces better disclosure and cleaner certification decisions.
Appointed Representatives Regulatory Responsibilities
The FCA has repeatedly found principals exercising insufficient oversight of their AR networks, and the principal answers for the AR's conduct. ARs frequently operate at a distance with limited compliance infrastructure of their own. Training them directly is one of the clearest ways a principal can evidence the oversight the regulator expects, and it reduces the conduct risk sitting outside the firm's own walls.
COBS - Appropriateness
The awkward part is the second half: what happens after a warning is given and the client insists. Firms differ in practice and the records rarely show the reasoning. The FCA has looked closely at execution-only journeys for complex products. Training staff on the process end to end protects the customer and gives the firm a file that explains itself later.
COBS - Client Communications High Risk Investments
The FCA tightened this area after sustained consumer harm in high-risk and speculative products, and the requirements around risk warnings, cooling-off and consumer categorisation are prescriptive. Marketing teams frequently do not know a product has crossed into the high-risk category. Training them alongside compliance is what keeps promotions inside the rules rather than requiring withdrawal after publication.
COBS - Suitability
Suitability failings are the single largest source of redress in retail investment, and they are judged years later on the file alone. What the adviser understood at the time counts for nothing if it was not recorded. Training staff on both the assessment and the evidence it must leave behind protects clients and protects the firm from a liability that compounds quietly.
Introduction to the Perimeter Guidance Manual
Perimeter questions surface when a business launches something new, changes a process or takes on an unfamiliar client, and getting the answer wrong means carrying on a regulated activity without permission. That is a criminal offence and voids contracts. Giving product, commercial and legal staff a working grasp of PERG means the question gets asked before the activity starts.
SEC Rule 15a-6
The exemptions are narrow and depend on the role of a US registered broker-dealer in the chain, which means an unsupervised call or email can breach them. SEC enforcement reaches firms with no US presence. Training the sales and research staff who might contact a US person keeps the exemption intact, since it is lost through ordinary contact rather than deliberate evasion.
ICOBS - Providing Information and Advising
Remuneration and fee disclosure is an area the FCA revisits regularly, and the boundary between information and advice is crossed easily in conversation. Both determine what the customer can later claim they were owed. Training intermediary staff on the specific disclosure points keeps the sales journey compliant and produces files that stand up when a case is reviewed long after the sale.
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Principles for Businesses [Mutual]
Mutuals answer to members as well as regulators, and the two sets of expectations usually point the same way. The Principles give staff a framework for judgement in the situations no procedure covers. Grounding the workforce in them supports the member relationship and gives your governance arrangements a consistent basis when a decision has to be justified.
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ICOBS - Providing Information and Advising [Mutual]
Members expect their society to be straightforward about what it charges and what it is recommending, and the regulatory requirements point in the same direction. The distinction between information and advice determines what the organisation is liable for. Training staff on where that line sits protects both the member relationship and the file quality your organisation relies on if a case is reviewed.
Whistleblowing in Financial Services
The FCA expects firms to have whistleblowing arrangements that work, with a senior manager accountable for them, and it treats the suppression of concerns as a serious failing. Regulatory references also travel with individuals. Making the protections credible to the whole workforce is what turns a compliant structure into a channel that actually receives information the firm needs.
Introduction to the Consumer Duty
The short format works as a baseline for staff whose roles touch customers indirectly, where a full course would be disproportionate but ignorance is not acceptable. Outcomes are produced across the whole business, including by teams that never speak to a customer. Establishing the vocabulary everywhere is what makes the firm's outcomes monitoring reflect something real.
Non-Financial Misconduct
The FCA has made clear it will consider non-financial misconduct when assessing fitness and propriety, which turns behaviour previously treated as an HR matter into a regulatory one that can end a career in financial services. Firms are also expected to report it. Making that connection explicit changes how seriously the population treats conduct that would otherwise stay informal.
BCOBS - Distance Communications
Nearly all account opening now happens at a distance, which makes these rules the default rather than the exception. Pre-contract information and cancellation rights are prescriptive and time-bound. Training the staff who design and operate digital and telephone journeys builds compliance into the process, rather than discovering a disclosure gap that affected every customer through the journey.
ICOBS - Cancellation and Claims
These are the two moments the customer finds out what the policy was actually worth, and both produce complaints out of proportion to their volume. Delay and unexplained declines are the usual triggers. Training the staff who handle cancellations and claims improves outcomes where the FCA looks hardest and reduces the referrals that end up with the Ombudsman.
ICOBS - Distance Communications
Most insurance is now sold remotely, so these rules govern the standard sales journey rather than an unusual one. The requirements are specific about what must be provided and when. Training the teams who build and run online and telephone journeys keeps the disclosure correct at the design stage, which is the only place it can be fixed cheaply.
ICOBS - General Matters
Customer categorisation determines the protections owed for the life of a relationship, so an error at the start propagates through everything after it. The communication standard now sits alongside the Consumer Duty's requirement that customers genuinely understand. Training staff on both keeps categorisation consistent and communications defensible when a case is reviewed.
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BCOBS - Distance Communications [Mutual]
Members increasingly join and transact entirely online, which means the distance rules govern the ordinary journey rather than an exception. Societies with a branch heritage sometimes carry disclosure practice designed for a counter conversation. Training staff who run digital and telephone journeys keeps the required information in the right place at the right point in the process.
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ICOBS - Cancellation and Claims [Mutual]
Members judge the organisation on how a claim is handled far more than on how a policy was sold, and word travels quickly in a membership base. The regulatory expectations point the same way. Training the staff who handle these processes protects the member relationship and reduces the complaints that would otherwise reach the Ombudsman with costs attached.
![ICOBS - Distance Communications [Mutual]](https://www.skillcast.com/hubfs/skillcast-theme-2025/imagery/2026%20Course%20Images/281170045175_1517459258_ICOBS%20-%20Distance%20Communications%20%5BMutual%5D_ID.webp)
ICOBS - Distance Communications [Mutual]
Members expect the same clarity online that they would get across a counter, and the rules require it. Distance journeys remove the chance to explain something the customer has misread, which is why the prescribed information matters more, not less. Training the teams who design these journeys keeps disclosure right at the point it is built in.
![ICOBS - General Matters [Mutual]](https://www.skillcast.com/hubfs/skillcast-theme-2025/imagery/2026%20Course%20Images/281168270574_275353262_ICOBS%20-%20General%20Matters%20%5BMutual%5D_ID.webp)
ICOBS - General Matters [Mutual]
Categorisation sets the protections a customer receives, and members will reasonably assume they are being given the most protective treatment available. The clear and fair standard now operates alongside Consumer Duty expectations about understanding. Training staff on both keeps your communications consistent with the standard members expect and the one the regulator applies.
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Introduction to the Senior Managers and Certification Regime (SM&CR)
Most people at a regulated firm are affected by at least one part of the regime without ever having it explained to them. That gap shows up in reference requests, certification cycles and breach reporting. A short introduction across the whole population gives everything else in your SM&CR programme something to attach to.
Appropriate Use of Communication Channels
Regulators on both sides of the Atlantic have imposed very large fines specifically for off-channel communications, in cases where the underlying business was entirely legitimate. The failure is the record, not the conduct. Making the permitted list and the recording obligation explicit is the cheapest possible protection against a penalty that is entirely avoidable.
SDR and Investment Labels
Sustainability-related claims in financial products must be clear, transparent and backed by evidence. This training explores the Financial Conduct Authority’s Sustainability Disclosure Requirements and how to ensure compliance while avoiding misleading statements.
Car Finance Mis-selling
The Financial Conduct Authority banned discretionary commission arrangements in car finance due to concerns about unfair interest rates. This training explains the impact of the ban, the rise in consumer complaints and the steps lenders and brokers must take to ensure fair financial practices.
Conduct Rule 1: Act with Integrity
Integrity is a fundamental principle in financial services, ensuring ethical conduct and maintaining customer trust. This training explains Conduct Rule 1: Act with Integrity, highlighting its importance, examples of misconduct and the consequences of breaching this rule.
Conduct Rule 2: Act with due skill, care and diligence
People working in financial services must act with due skill, care and diligence, ensuring their actions do not harm customers or the financial system. This training explores Conduct Rule 2: Act with Due Skill, Care and Diligence, helping employees understand how to make informed decisions, assess risks carefully and maintain high professional standards.
Conduct Rule 3: Be open and cooperative with the FCA, the PRA and other regulators
Financial services firms and employees must be open and cooperative with regulators, including the Financial Conduct Authority and the Prudential Regulation Authority. This training explores Conduct Rule 3: Be Open and Cooperative with Regulators, helping employees understand their responsibilities in responding to regulatory requests and maintaining transparency.
Conduct Rule 4: Pay due regard to the interests of customers and treat them fairly
Financial services professionals must always act in the best interests of customers and ensure they are treated fairly. This training explores Conduct Rule 4: Pay Due Regard to Customers' Interests and Treat Them Fairly, helping employees understand their responsibility to provide clear, accurate and fair customer interactions.
Conduct Rule 5: Observe proper standards of market conduct
Financial markets rely on trust, integrity and adherence to established rules and ethical behaviour. This training explores Conduct Rule 5: Observe Proper Standards of Market Conduct, ensuring employees understand their responsibility to uphold market integrity and comply with regulatory standards.
Conduct Rule 6: Act to deliver good outcomes for retail customers
Financial services professionals must act in good faith, prevent foreseeable harm and support customers in achieving their financial objectives. This training explores Conduct Rule 6: Act to Deliver Good Outcomes for Retail Customers, ensuring employees understand their role in delivering fair treatment and transparent services.
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