Vol. 554 No. 5
420 Mr. Haughey asked the Minister for Finance the types of personal identification specified in law which must be produced by a person wishing to open a bank account in a commercial bank; the reason such personal identification is required; if his attention has been drawn to the fact that this can cause problems for some people in view of the expense involved; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [16424/02]
The Criminal Justice Act, 1994 implements the EU Money Laundering Directive in Ireland. Section 32 of the Act provides, inter alia, that a financial institution “shall take reasonable measures to establish the identity of any person for whom it proposes to provide a service”. It is the legal responsibility of each financial institution to ensure that it complies with this provision. The obligation on financial institutions to identify customers is a basic element in the anti-money laundering regime both in Ireland and internationally.
The Act does not state what may or may not represent reasonable measures and does not provide for the making of regulations in this regard. Accordingly, in order to facilitate consistent implementation of the anti-money laundering provisions of the Act, Guidance Notes were issued in April 1995 by the Money Laundering Steering Committee, established under the aegis of my Department and representing various sectors of the financial services industry and the relevant authorities.
While the 1995 Guidance Notes gave credit institutions discretion to deal with customers who do not possess the recommended forms of identification, it became clear that difficulties were being experienced by particular social groups in opening bank accounts. To deal with this problem the 1995 guidance on customer identification was revised to ensure that measures adopted by institutions should not deny a person access to financial services on the grounds that they do not possess specified identification documentation, while at the same time ensuring that financial institutions are in a position to comply with their legal obligations.
Following approval by the Money Laundering Steering Committee, revised Guidance Notes were issued to all credit institutions in November 2001 with a request that revised procedures be put in place as soon as possible but in any event no later than 1 May 2002. While the revised Guidance Notes provide additional examples of documents which may be used to verify identity at account opening, the basic recommendation to credit institutions is that they should verify a customers name by seeking a document which bears a photograph and signature. Wherever possible a current valid full passport should be requested. There are of course other documents that customers might produce as evidence of their identity, e.g. driver's licence with photograph, age card issued by the Garda Community Relations Section.
