The Office of Fair Trading is expected to clamp down hard this year on estate agents who have not registered for anti-money laundering.
It follows the revelation that last year, the OFT contacted 212 estate agents and warned all of them to register immediately. One firm that initially ignored the warning was hit with a £2,000 fine – the minimum.
The ‘light touch’ monitoring regime that the OFT has so far employed is set to end.
Whilst £2,000 is the smallest penalty for non-registration, penalties for non-registration can include up to two years in prison and unlimited fines. Failure to report suspicious activity could result in a 14-year sentence.
Mario Tsavellas, OFT Director of Anti-Money Laundering, said: “The OFT is committed to supporting businesses through education, advice and guidance. However, where necessary, we will use our powers to impose penalties or prosecute non-compliant businesses.”
We fully realise that this is not the most popular topic, but please see the blog on the site today, which gives guidance on the subject.
It is useful for new firms, bringing new members of staff up to speed, and as a timely reminder for others.
Comments
However whilst we are having to get and store this info, the actual potential culprits get away with a custodial sentence if it pleases the courts whilst we again become the whipping boys with a possible 14 year stretch what a load of wasters we have to answer to and to think, I thought I was running my own business and being my own boss, too many sleeping partners here and that includes the taxman.
Incidentally, we register for the money laundering and the data protection act, who gets to call the shots on the info we do have, is it that we give to the TSO and the SFO's or do we refuse because of the data protection act!
Pointless, we have to record details about our clients the sellers ... it is far more likely that buyers will be laundering the money and surely it is at this point rather than years later that any suspicious activity is both likely to be picked up, and should be. I find it pretty hard to think of clearly suspicious activity in selling but can easily think of dodgy buyer signals. I feel it is an unnecessary burden on business to have to keep these sort of records on sellers, and that it is an imposition on sellers right to privacy, and a risk to their own ID protection to have us keeping records on usually innocent sellers for donkeys years. I have personally seen 2 senior estate agents instruct staff to clear out years of old files by throwing them into commercial waste (not for shredding).We should not have to hold this personal info.
Arrrrrrrrggggghhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I wouldn't mind paying the ML fee & doing the paperwork if when they caught the drug dealers, they strung them up.
Instead they do a couple of months inside or are fined less than our annual ML fee - but don't pay it. Nuts.