Money Laundering Regulation- Alliance & Leicester

mich_roh

Another reply more confusion ... they cannot tell me which countries access is blocked .. European countries are fine ??? I assume they have less risk of money laundering in Europe ??? Why is there a discrimination between countries ?

Thank you for your e-mail requesting a list of countries where you will be limited to accessing your account.

I am sorry but such a list is unavailable. As a guidance you should be able to access your account via European countries.

I do hope you find the above information useful, however, if you have any further questions or need any more help please visit our ‘Help’ section online or contact us again.

Kind regards

Customer Services
Alliance & Leicester plc


--Original Message--

Thanks for the info. The only reason for this query was that I had to spend significant amount of money making international calls to administer my account.

Please could you give me a list of countries which are blocked by AANDL. Is there a list available in the Terms & Conditions? If there is please could you give me a link ?

Thank You

Gabriel-Ernest

mich_roh wrote:

European countries are fine ??? I assume they have less risk of money laundering in Europe ??? Why is there a discrimination between countries ?

Western Europe generally has a lower risk because they have implemented AML policies which are judged to be effective and the equivalent of FATF (Financial Action Task Force). The strictest regime globally is considered to be that in the UK.

There are 3 basic levels -

1) FATF-equivalent jurisdictions (typically Western Europe, USA, Canada, Australia, NZ)

2) Virtually everyone else to varying degrees

3) NCCT (Non-Cooperative Countries and Territories) - the list used to contain Nigeria, Cooks Islands, Israel, Nauru etc; the last NCCT was Myanmar removed 13-Oct-06.

India would fall into the middle category. One major anomaly is that Russia is technically considered FATF-equivalent for political reasons, but in practical terms it's still treated as high-risk by institutions. Generally any jurisdiction NOT considered to be FATF-equivalent will be subjected to further scrutiny and deeper AML checks.

FATF

mich_roh

Thanks for the info. I appreciate the threat.

But again I am not carrying out any international transactions on my account and my account does not allow me to do so anyways ... I was simply accessing my bank account over the internet from India to transfer funds within the UK.

I just looked into the website India is a member of the Asia Pacific Group an association of FATF.
http://www.fatf-gafi.org/document/19/0,2340,en_32250379_32236869_34354899_1_1_1_1,00.html

Gabriel-Ernest

mich_roh wrote:

Thanks for the info. I appreciate the threat.

But again I am not carrying out any international transactions on my account and my account does not allow me to do so anyways ... I was simply accessing my bank account over the internet from India to transfer funds within the UK.

I'm afraid I can't answer why your bank is causing you problems - I work in wholesale/investment, not retail. Hope you get it sorted.