United Kingdom (and EU regulation)

Joint Committee of the ESAs consults on draft guidelines under revised Wire Transfer Regulation

Article 25 of the Wire Transfer Regulation (WTR) requires the European Supervisory Authorities (ESAs) to issue guidelines to Member State national competent authorities and payment service providers (PSPs) on the measures PSPs should take to comply with WTR and in particular in relation to the implementation of Articles 7,8,11 and 12 of WTR.

The ESAs have now jointly published a consultation paper setting out draft guidelines under Article 25 of the WTR on the measures PSPs should take to detect missing or incomplete information on the payer or the payee, and the procedures that they should put in place to manage a transfer of funds lacking the required information.

Through the guidelines, the ESAs aim to promote the development of a common understanding, by PSPs and competent authorities across the EU, of what effective procedures to detect and manage transfers of funds that lack required information on the payer and the payee are and how they should be applied.

The guidelines are intended to:

help PSPs determine which transfers of funds are within the WTR, including with regard to the exemptions foreseen in Article 2(3) of WTR;
help PSPs determine which role they play in the payment chain and consequently, which obligations WTR imposes on them. This is important as WTR does not require intermediary PSPs to identify whether information on the payer or the payee that accompanies a transfer of funds is incomplete;
provide PSPs with tools to establish and implement effective procedures to detect transfers of funds that lack required information on the payer or the payee, and to follow up should this be necessary;
set out risk factors PSPs should consider when determining whether to execute, reject or suspend a transfer of funds which lack required information on the payer or the payee, including assessing whether the lack of information gives rise to suspicion of money laundering / terrorism financing; and
help Member State national competent authorities assess whether the procedures PSPs have put in place to comply with Articles 7,8,11 and 12 of WTR are adequate and effective.

A public hearing on the draft guidelines will take place at the European Banking Authority’s premises in London on 19 May 2017 from 10:30am to 12:30pm UK time.

The deadline for comments on the consultation paper is 5 June 2017.

View Joint Committee of the ESAs consults on draft guidelines under revised Wire Transfer Regulation, 5 April 2017