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Government watch
Compliance
AlliAnce
$4 billion of which has been since 2012, according to NERA Economic Consulting. The increased pressure from regulators and lawmakers has forced issuers to devote more resources to compliance. In a global 2014 study by KPMG, 78 percent of senior management and compliance officers polled said they’d seen an increase in their bank’s total investment in AML efforts over the previous three years; 74 percent expected more increases over the next three years.
It’s clear that, for prepaid provid- ers, ensuring compliance has never been more important. But success- fully doing so requires more than money and manpower. Rather, providers must adopt a “culture
of compliance,” wherein require- ments and expectations are understood clearly throughout
the company and are fulfilled with ongoing, proactive and leadership- supported compliance procedures. To achieve this, many prepaid providers are turning to compli- ance support specialists for guidance on where to start and how to maintain an effective BSA/ AML compliance program.
It Starts at the Top
Active support from corporate leadership is critical to a culture
of compliance, notes Craig James, CEO of Neopay Ltd., a compliance support firm with a global client base. “Executive buy-in is absolutely vital to a company’s compliance success. If the business owners and department heads understand why compliance is important, then that
With regulators upping pressure on AML/BSA procedures, prepaid providers seek support from specialists.
By Adam Perrotta, Assistant Editor
U.S.
2011 Prepaid Access Rule. And in March of 2015, then-New York Dept. of Financial Services Super- intendent Benjamin Lawsky floated a plan to hold top bank executives personally responsible for the quality and effectiveness of their companies’ AML efforts.
Federal regulators levied nearly
$5 billion in penalties against financial institutions in connection with alleged violations of BSA/AML regulations since 2007—more than
message that AML and BSA compliance pro-
regulators have sent a clear
cesses have room for improvement and must be fully ingrained in a company’s business from the top down. Multiple FDIC consent orders have focused on beefing up AML procedures and compliance staff, while 2014 FinCEN guidance on BSA/AML requirements identi- fies “shortcomings” the agency has found since establishing its