AML Round up

The ever increasing importance and visibility of AML and other economic crime issues at international, domestic and sectoral level means that it's vital for solicitors to be aware of the latest developments. Our latest AML round up provides the latest updates and news for the legal sector.

Meet our new AML team members

To ensure we continue to meet our responsibilities as an effective AML supervisor, we have welcomed two additional members of staff into the team recently, Jenni Rodgers and Dale Trahms.

There have been a number of important AML-related developments published on our website and elsewhere which we are keen to bring to your attention. These include:
• The revised LSAG guidance published in 2021 and has now been approved by HM Treasury
• Our refreshed Scottish Legal Sectoral Risk Assessment
• FATF’s recently published Risk-Based Approach for the Real Estate Sector, which you can find on our AML Toolkit page under the Guidance dropdown.

We have updated our FAQs on various topics including:
• discrepancies reporting to Companies House
• procedures to deal with clients that you do not meet in person
• guidance on the due diligence to conduct when dealing with matters funded by cryptocurrencies
• sanctions

Thematic review work

Our second thematic review on policies, controls and procedures is now underway. For further details on what the review will consist of, please visit our website.

Other AML and regulatory news

The UK Government recently introduced the Economic Crime (Transparency and Enforcement) Act 2022. This includes the new Register of Overseas Entities which opened at Companies House on 1 August 2022. You can read a recent blog from John Sinclair, Convener of the Property Law Committee, to assist practices with actions they may have to carry out as a result.

There have been further amendments to the 2017 Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing Regulations with the Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing (Amendment)(High-Risk Countries) Regulations 2022. These can be found on the UK Government’s website

HM Treasury has published its review of the Money Laundering Regulations, 2017, and the UK AML regulatory and supervisory regime. You can read more on the UK Government’s website

Obligations of trustees and duty to register relevant trusts with the HMRC Trust Registration Service (the TRS). You can read an article from Ian MacDonald, head of Private Client at Wright, Johnston & Mackenzie, on what this will mean for practitioners in the July edition of the Journal.

Amendments to the 2017 Regulations were published in 2019 and can be found on the UK Government’s website. This includes:

• Reporting discrepancies in beneficial ownership information to Companies House
• Amendments to Regulation 33 – enhanced due diligence
• Register if trust ultimate beneficial ownership

The National Crime Agency’s latest edition of “SARs in action” was published on its website in July. You can find this and previous editions of the magazine on the NCA website.

The UKFIU introduced a new SARs glossary codes and reporting routes for SARs which you can find on the Suspicious Activity Reporting pages in the AML section of our website.

The UKFIU recently ran a short webinar around the new SARs Digital Service & SAR Portal Update. This webinar provided a demonstration of the new portal and passed on the message, once this portal is rolled out in the coming months re-registration with the NCA’s SARs portal is required.

You can also find helpful  guidance and tutorial videos on how to submit SARs and DAMLs on our website.