Marshalls launches new FCA compliance training

Marshall E-Learning (Marshalls), part of the Ciphr Group, is launching 20 new employee training courses for FCA-regulated banks, insurers, and other financial services providers.

The first of Marshalls’ new FCA compliance training to debut this summer focuses on the Financial Conduct Authority’s new Consumer Duty rules, due to come into effect on 31 July. The course provides a timely introduction to the new duty, including how it applies and how it can be implemented so that different types of companies – and the staff working within them – meet their obligations to put consumers’ needs first and deliver fair value.

Importantly, the latest survey evidence from the FCA shows that most financial services firms say that they are on track to successfully implement these new consumer regulations, which will radically affect how businesses serve, communicate with, and support, new and existing retail customers.

A critical part of being Consumer Duty ready is ensuring that all employees – especially those that are front-line and customer-facing – have been trained in the intricacies of the new Consumer Duty requirements. Senior managers may also need additional, specialised training, as they will now be subject to a new (sixth) individual conduct rule under the Senior Managers and Certification Regime (SM&CR).

David Marshall, MD of Marshall E-Learning at Ciphr, says:

“The FCA’s new Consumer Duty has implications for financial services providers across many markets. The new regulations place an increased emphasis on transparency, accountability, and fair treatment of consumers, and financial services staff will need up-to-date, regular training as part of that to fully understand and implement all these changes effectively. Failure to meet these new obligations could result in big fines from the FCA, so there’s a big incentive for organisations to get this right.

“In addition to covering the consumer duty, our new compliance courses – developed in partnership with Victoria Sena, a well-known expert in regulation, compliance, governance, and risk management – will feature other key financial regulations, such as the AIFMD, IDD, Solvency II, and MiFID II frameworks, and give an overview of the roles of the UK’s main financial regulators for newer employees. There will also be a dedicated risk and risk management series, focusing on operational risk, market risk, conduct risk, communications, gifts and inducements, and training on combating greenwashing and how to incorporate sustainability into business practices. Some of these courses are available to buy now, while others will be released over the coming few months.”

Marshall adds: “We’ve worked closely with many financial organisations over the years, such as the Bank of England, the FCA, Lloyd’s and Prudential, on their diversity and inclusion programmes. This new compliance training significantly broadens our content offering and enables us to support even more people working in this important sector with their essential training and development, and CPD requirements.”

New compliance training courses from Marshall E-Learning in 2023 include:

• Consumer Duty
• Introduction to the Bank of England and Prudential Regulation Authority
• Introduction to the Financial Conduct Authority
• Introduction to The Pensions Regulator
• Introduction to the Financial Ombudsman Service
• Spotlight on APER for FCA-approved workers
• Spotlight on MiFID II regulates financial markets for the benefit of investors
• Spotlight on AIFMD for alternative investments
• Spotlight on Solvency II for insurance regulators
• Spotlight on EMIR for European Market Infrastructure Regulation
• Spotlight on IDD for insurance regulators
• Market Risk
• Operational Risk
• Conduct Risk (Human Risk)
• Communication
• Gifts and Inducements
• Senior Managers and Certification Regime
• Greenwashing
• Understanding Sustainable Finance
• FinTech and RegTech

Existing courses, including those on ‘vulnerable customers’ and ‘treating customers fairly’, are also being updated to reflect the new duty.

For FCA-regulated companies looking to find out more about how to create engaging and effective employee training programmes – particularly in light of the new Consumer Duty changes – Marshalls and Ciphr are co-hosting a live webinar on the subject on Tuesday 8 August (11am). It will be led by Consumer Duty course creator and FCA expert Victoria Sena (MCSI), founder of Cherrybank Consulting, alongside Ciphr learning expert Andrea Matkin.

The session will explore some of the latest legislative changes in the sector, including the launch of the Consumer Duty and recent SM&CR consultation, and discuss training priorities that HR and L&D professionals need to consider to meet regulatory compliance. There will also be practical tips around how to structure programmes of learning for different job roles and seniority levels, including onboarding new starters, and what to include in ongoing, annual training programmes to maintain competence and qualification requirements.

To register for the webinar, please visit here.

Marshalls is a leading UK-based provider of off-the-shelf eLearning content, renowned for its expertise in diversity, inclusion and unconscious bias. Its extensive library of modules and content packs, which also includes compliance, safeguarding, health, safety, wellbeing and management development training, integrate seamlessly with learning management systems such as Ciphr LMS.

Over two million people have been trained by Marshalls to date, including employees at Prudential Group, Bank of England, The Scottish Parliament, Santander, Hitachi, Rolls-Royce, Manchester City Council, NHS Employers, and many universities across the UK and Ireland.

Marshalls is part of Ciphr – a leading UK-based provider of integrated HR, payroll, learning and recruitment solutions. More than 600 organisations use the group’s people management solutions globally across the public, private and non-profit sectors.

For more information, please visit here.