SRA puts firms on notice for money laundering compliance checks

We will be carrying out rigorous checks on law firms to make sure they are meeting their anti-money laundering obligations.We will shortly be writing to an initial sample of 400 firms asking them to demonstrate compliance with the Government’s 2017 Money Laundering Regulations1. There are around 7,000 SRA-regulated law firms who fall under the scope of these Regulations.We want to make sure that firms have a money laundering risk assessment in place and are implementing it. A risk assessment is required by legislation and should be the backbone of a firm’s anti-money laundering approach. If firms are not complying, they will go into the regulator’s enforcement processes.Each case will be judged on its facts, but if there are serious issues or a lack of willing to resolve issues promptly, we will take disciplinary action. We also plan to carry out further compliance checks if we find that there are sector-wide issues.Paul Philip, SRA Chief Executive, said:

“Money laundering is far from being a victimless crime and must be taken …read more