Elephants Don’t Forget and Square 4 Join Forces on Consumer Duty

Elephants Don’t Forget and Square 4 are joining forces to link colleague competence with customer outcomes.

The collaboration brings together Elephants Don’t Forget’s continual assessment technology, Clever Nelly, with Square 4’s regulatory advisory services and Assure 4, its technology platform for customer outcomes testing and validation.

The two organisations said the partnership is intended to connect regulatory interpretation, colleague learning, knowledge retention and customer outcome testing.

Their joint research identified two areas that can contribute to poor customer outcomes. The first is a failure to maintain employee competence over time, with employees potentially struggling to retain and apply knowledge gained during initial training.

The second relates to policies, processes and controls that may themselves contribute to poor outcomes, even when employees are following the guidance provided.

Research presented during an April 2026 webinar hosted by the two organisations found that 6% of 470 senior financial services professionals surveyed said they systematically link staff competence with outcome testing. A further 67% said they still rely on activity-based metrics to evidence good outcomes to the FCA.

The findings suggest that firms may need to look beyond measures such as training completion and attendance when assessing whether employees understand, retain and apply the knowledge required to support customers.

Under the partnership, Clever Nelly will be used to identify individual and collective knowledge and competence gaps, while Assure 4 will be used to test customer outcomes across key journeys.

The organisations said the combined approach is intended to provide evidence covering both colleague competence and the outcomes experienced by customers.

Luke Wootton, Chief Commercial Officer at Square 4 Partners Limited, said:

“Consumer Duty has raised expectations around the evidence firms must provide to demonstrate that they are delivering good outcomes. Processes and controls remain important, but the competence of the colleagues applying them is equally critical.

“Our research has shown the important relationship between colleague knowledge, competence and the outcomes experienced by customers.

By combining Clever Nelly’s ability to identify and address knowledge gaps with Square 4’s regulatory expertise and the outcomes-validation capabilities of Assure 4, we can help firms understand not only whether their people know what to do, but whether that knowledge is translating into better customer outcomes.

We look forward to deploying this technology with both our client base and within our own Managed Service operation based in Leeds.”

As part of the partnership, Square 4 will also roll out Clever Nelly across its Managed Service operation in Leeds. The platform will be used to assess and evidence colleague competence among teams delivering regulated services on behalf of clients.

Ryan Hampson, Sales and Marketing Director at Elephants Don’t Forget, said:

“Traditional training often measures attendance or completion rather than whether critical knowledge has genuinely been retained. Clever Nelly provides organisations with continuous, individualised insight into what their colleagues know, what they have forgotten and where intervention is required.

“Square 4’s regulatory expertise, Consumer Duty research and Assure 4 technology create an exciting opportunity to connect colleague competence with real customer outcomes. Together, we can provide firms with stronger evidence, clearer insights and a more effective way to embed good customer outcomes throughout their organisations.”

The partnership will also support firms preparing Consumer Duty assessments and Board reports. Data from Clever Nelly can provide evidence relating to colleague competence and knowledge retention, while Square 4’s regulatory expertise can be used to consider this alongside areas including customer understanding, consumer support, vulnerability and outcomes.

Assure 4 can additionally be used to assess outcomes across customer journeys such as onboarding, servicing, vulnerability, collections, complaints and offboarding.

The organisations said the partnership will focus on connecting three areas: what firms expect their colleagues to do, what colleagues understand and retain, and what customers experience as a result.

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About Elephants Dont Forget

Elephants Don’t Forget is the home of Clever Nelly — a multi-award-winning, AI-powered continual assessment platform that helps organisations maintain consistent frontline performance, reduce risk, and improve operational KPIs.

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Author: Hannah Swankie