The Financial Services Commission ("FSC") issued its Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism Handbook in 2020 (the initial AML/CFT Handbook) with main objective to provide guidance to financial institutions in complying with measures that have been implemented on a national basis to combat money laundering and financing of terrorism; through legislations and statutes which are mainly the Financial Intelligence and Anti-Money Laundering Act, 2002 ("FIAMLA") and Financial Intelligence and Anti-Money Laundering Regulations, 2018 ("FIAML Regulations").
The guidelines encompass several areas such as corporate governance, customer due diligence requirements, adoption of risk-based approach among others. An amendment to the initial AML/CFT Handbook was made on the 21 September 2022. Below you can find details of the updates as authored by Yash Beharee, Head of Compliance at Apex Group Mauritius.
- Authorised Certification
The chapter 5.10 which falls under the category of ‘Customer Due Diligence’ of the AML CFT FSC Handbook 2020 (updated) now states the below with respect to certification:
5.10 Certification
Where a financial institution relies upon verification of identity documentation that is not in an original form, the documentation must be appropriately certified as true copies of the original documentation.
Where an employee of a financial institution meets an applicant for business or the principals thereof face-to-face and has access to original verification of identity documentation, he or she may take copies of the verification of identity documentation and certify them personally as true copies of the original documentation.
- Who can certify documents?
In other cases, copies of the verification of identity documentation can be certified by a suitable person, such as an attorney, a lawyer, a notary, an actuary, an accountant or any other person holding a recognised professional qualification, director or secretary of a regulated financial institution in Mauritius or meets the FATF’s standards, a member of the judiciary or a senior civil servant.
- Certification wording to be used
The certifier should sign the copy document and clearly indicate the date of certification, his or her name, address and position or capacity on it together with contact details to facilitate tracing of the certifier and, where available, any registration number with any professional body.
- Important point to note
The above list of suitable certifiers is not intended to be exhaustive and financial institutions should exercise due caution when considering certified copy documents, especially where such documents originate from a country perceived to represent a high risk or from unregulated entities in any jurisdiction. Where certified copy documents are accepted, it is the financial institutions’ responsibility to ensure that the certifier is appropriate. In all cases, financial institutions should also ensure that the customer's signature on the identification document matches the signature on the application form, mandate or other document.
- Independent audit:
Under section 13.3.1 of the updated FSC AML Handbook regarding assessing the independence of the audit professional, change has been made to guidelines on outsourcing of independent audit from “accountants or independent consultants duly regulated or registered by relevant competent authorities” to “independent service providers/consultants”. This brings more flexibility in choice of external service provider to perform the independent AML audit.
Note: The updated AML/CFT Handbook became applicable as from 21 September 2022.
The FSC communique with respect to the updates can be accessed here: Financial Services Commission (“FSC”)
