I am involved with a couple of trusts who have been approached, specifically, by Barclays Bank regarding KYC on the trustees. Barclays are threatening to close the account.
Interestingly, this is not just on the trustees who are signatories on the account, but all those included on the trust deed.
Has anyone else suffered through this process?
Trustees needing to visit a bank, in person, to be told that the Business dept will not see them (even though the request can from the Business Team), to then go to a teller, having been told by the floor walkers and then redirected to the personal bankers. This all took in excess of 1 hour with then another 30mins wait because of not having an appointment booked. The personal banker, didn’t really understand the requirements and was unable to log the documents with the relevant account. Some weeks, later, with numerous bank visits, emails and telephone calls, the bank have still not been able to confirm receipt of the AML documents and are still sending letters.
We are looking to go to the Charity Commission next but has anyone else had success with this process?
The bouncing of customers from pillar to post is unacceptable in any business – banks don’t have a monopoly.
I suggest a letter to the bank’s Head of Compliance as AML and KYC should be under their control.
I am not unduly surprised that the bank also requires KYC on all of the parties to the original settlement as part of their checks will include “source of funds”. I am aware of more than one trust where potential replacement trustees have walked away from “lucrative” appointments as, when undertaking due diligence, they have been unable to satisfy their own compliance officers that they could answer the various required KYC/AML questions satisfactorily.
As had been commented before on this Forum, trustees are being increasingly strangled by regulations.
Paul Saunders FCIB TEP
Independent Trust Consultant
Providing support and advice to fellow professionals
I work with a number of charities and dealing with AML and bank accounts has become increasingly difficult. I made contact with all the high street banks and a few other providers to find out each providers process. I have to say Barclays was the only one still requiring branch visits to evidence. Other banks deal with this digitally. So may be worth looking around.
Metro would be a suitable alternative in my view and will generally accept KYC documents certified by you submitted electronically. They are also able to deal with electronic transfers requiring dual authorisation via call-backs. That said, in addition to certified copies of trust documentation, they will require ML docs on all trustees and on all beneficiaries cited by name in either the trust deed or subsequent appointments. My contact at the bank is Peter King: peter.king@metrobank.plc.uk