RBS Fined £5.6m For Anti-Terror Failings
Sector: Banking & Finance
3rd August 2010
The Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) has been fined £5.6m for failing to ensure that customers and their transactions were not involved in terrorism. The Financial Services Authority (FSA) said the fine was the biggest yet for breaking the rules on financial crime. During 2008, RBS and its subsidiaries failed to check if customers were on the Treasury's sanctions lists. The FSA said this resulted in an "unacceptable risk" of RBS facilitating the financing of terrorism. "The involvement of UK financial institutions in providing funds, economic resources or financial services to designated persons on the sanctions list undermines the integrity of the UK's financial services sector," said Margaret Cole, the FSA's director of enforcement and financial crime. "By failing to screen relevant customers and payments against the HM Treasury sanctions list, RBS group left itself open to the risk that it was facilitating terrorist financing."
The bank's failings took place between December 2007 and December 2008, not only at RBS but also its subsidiaries NatWest, Ulster bank and Coutts & Co. The FSA pointed out that the RBS group had, in 2007, handled more foreign payments than any other bank in the UK. If the bank had not admitted its failings it would have been fined £8m, the FSA said.
Source: Times
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