Built for directly authorised firms
Everything the FCA expects you to evidence, in one place.
Holiday, sickness, CPD, competency tests, file checks and annual reviews — recorded properly, calculated automatically, and ready to show when somebody asks.
Why it exists
Being directly authorised means the evidence is yours to keep
An appointed representative can lean on their network's systems. A directly authorised firm cannot. Your training and competence scheme, your file checking, your CPD records and your annual reviews are your responsibility — and they need to be demonstrable, not just done.
Most small firms end up with a spreadsheet for holiday, a folder for certificates, and a memory for everything else. That works right up until somebody asks you to prove it.
The before and after
“Whose CPD is behind?” — open the spreadsheet, work it out by hand, hope it's current.
It's on the dashboard when you sign in, judged against how much of the year has actually passed.
“When did everyone last pass their tests?” — dig through email for certificates.
A live tick-list per person, with reminders sent automatically before anything lapses.
Holiday & absence
Requests in, approvals out, balances that work themselves out
Staff pick their dates and see the cost in days before they submit. You approve or decline with one click, with clash warnings if somebody else is already off. Weekends and bank holidays are handled automatically, and nobody ever types a balance.
- Shared calendar shows who's off — never why
- Sickness tracked separately, with rolling 12-month totals
- Real gov.uk bank holidays, refreshed yearly
Training & competence
Competency tests that chase themselves
Product and regulatory modules, each valid for twelve months from the day it was passed. Reminders go out automatically at ten and eleven months, and you're told the moment one lapses — because an expired test on a regulated adviser is the firm's problem, not just theirs.
- CPD hours judged against time elapsed, not the calendar year-end
- Certificates attached as evidence, stored privately
- Every previous pass kept — history is never overwritten
File checking
Coverage you can put a number on
Set a target percentage of each adviser's cases to check, record the outcome — suitable, with recommendations, with comments, or unsuitable — and see coverage against target at a glance. Clean passes are counted separately, so a drift towards “suitable with recommendations” is visible instead of hiding inside a pass rate.
- Findings and actions shared with the adviser — it's their feedback
- Follow-ups tracked until they're closed
- Reviews, one-to-ones and role plays kept alongside
Everything included
Six things, properly joined up
Each one calculates rather than asks you to type a number, and none of them overwrite last year when this year starts.
Holiday
Staff request, you approve. Balances are calculated from approved bookings, weekends and bank holidays are handled, and a shared calendar shows who is off without exposing why.
Sickness
Recorded rather than requested, with rolling twelve-month totals for days and occasions. Open-ended absences count up to today until somebody returns.
CPD
A target that can differ year to year, progress judged against time elapsed, evidence certificates attached, and every year kept separately.
Competency tests
Product and regulatory modules, each valid twelve months. Reminders go out automatically at ten and eleven months, and managers are told the moment one lapses.
File checks
Record checks against a percentage of each adviser's cases. Suitable, with recommendations, with comments or unsuitable — with clean passes counted separately so drift is visible.
Reviews and one-to-ones
One annual review a year and a one-to-one each quarter, with role plays attached. Overdue conversations flag themselves rather than sitting quietly at scheduled.
Security
Employee data, treated like it matters
Permissions on the server
Staff see their own records and nothing else — enforced in the database, not by hiding buttons. Changing an ID in the address bar gets a blank, not a colleague's file.
Health data stays private
Sickness records are visible only to the person and their manager, and never appear on the shared calendar.
Everything is audited
Approvals, edits and deletions land in an append-only log — who, what and when, with no way to quietly rewrite it.
Hardened by default
Argon2 password hashing, sign-in lockouts, HTTPS-only sessions, and uploads validated by content — not just filename.
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