One in Five UK Law Firms Fails to Comply With Money Laundering Regulators, Ethic Body Says
The lawyer regulator has warned that it is going to crack down on noncompliance.
October 29, 2019 at 12:31 AM
1 minute read
Solicitors Regulation Authority
The Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) has said that it will boost its checks on law firms after finding that a fifth of firms were not complying with money laundering regulations.
The U.K. regulator warned of a tougher stance on non-compliance after it found that 21% of 400 firms written to earlier this year either did not address all the risk areas required or sent over something other than a firm risk assessment.
It added that it would be will be asking the 7,000 firms that should adhere to the Money Laundering Regulations to confirm that they have appropriate risk assessments in place.
According to the SRA's annual risk outlook report, published today, the regulator has opened 172 investigations linked to anti-money-laundering compliance since the beginning of the year.
In the last five years, the SRA has passed over 60 such cases to the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal, following which more than 40 lawyers have been either struck off or suspended.
The SRA said that it would "be carrying out an extensive programme of targeted, in-depth visits to firms and calling in more firms' risk assessments".
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