SMP Compliance Academy and Shopworks sign strategic partnership

June 2017

With increasingly onerous compliance requirements being placed on the gambling industry, a new partnership has been announced between training specialists SMP Compliance Academy and staff scheduling provider Shopworks that aims to ease the compliance burden on operators and deliver professionally developed training content within a streamlined and cost-effective delivery platform.

SMP Compliance Academy is a bespoke online training platform for digital and land-based gaming professionals and operators which was launched earlier this year by specialist industry consultancy SMP eGaming - part of Russell Bedford's Isle of Man firm. Shopworks builds bespoke workforce management and staff scheduling solutions that help businesses to run more efficiently and support, train and motivate staff.

This new alliance brings together the market leaders in the UK gaming industry for both compliance training and staff scheduling software. The partnership aims to integrate the two products to allow retail gaming staff easier access to high quality online training on Anti Money Laundering, Social Responsibility and Know Your Customer (KYC). Integrating the two platforms will allow operators to ensure that only trained personnel are scheduled in critical positions such as the cashier in a casino or, for instance that every betting shop or AGC has at least one trained person on site at all times.

Neil Young of SMP eGaming is excited about the partnership: "Shopworks are the ideal partner for us; they have a great reputation in the industry, the biggest market share and already offer strong controls to ensure operators' staff schedules are compliant. Their ability to check if an employee's training is up to date before allowing them to be scheduled matched with our ability to provide professional compliance training and assessment could be a game changer for compliance in land based gaming".

Mike Hennessy of Shopworks believes that the partnership will benefit the company's gambling sector customers: "Our customers tell us that they are under increasing pressure to ensure compliance throughout their estate, especially at the point of contact with customers and where cash is being handled. Shopworks has always had the ability to offer training to the tens of thousands of retail gaming staff that use our system in the UK and beyond. Now, through this partnership, we can link staff via our mobile portal to the best quality content from the SMP Compliance Academy which will be kept up to date and give operators unprecedented peace of mind that their staff's mandatory training requirements are being met".