This Practice Note explains the Financial Conduct Authority (fca) training and competence regime. The regime supports the FCA's consumer protection objective, which aims to ensure that employees who deal with customers in the regulated financial services market are competent and suitably qualified to do so.

The training and competence regime consists of:

1. •

   a high-level competence requirement (the ‘competent employees rule’) which applies to individuals engaged in the regulated activity in all UK-authorised firms (including wholesale firms) as set out in the Senior Management Arrangements Systems and Controls sourcebook (SYSC), and

2. •

   more detailed requirements for certain retail activities, including the need to attain a qualification where relevant, as set out in the Training and Competence sourcebook (TC)

The regime must also be seen against the backdrop of the FCA Consumer Duty set out in Principle 12 in the FCA Handbook (PRIN 12), which stipulates that a firm must act to deliver good outcomes for retail clients. The FCA has stated in its guidance on the Consumer Duty that, for instance, as part of their data monitoring, firms