OFAC Help on Wire Transfers - Mary Beth Guard

OFAC Help on Wire Transfers
by Mary Beth Guard, BOL Guru

Wire transfer transactions are typically extremely time sensitive. Your customer is in a hurry to transfer the funds, and the beneficiary is eagerly awaiting their receipt. The whole process can come to a crashing halt, however, if it appears one of the parties may be affected by OFAC sanctions. In the past, if you couldn't confirm on your own that the transaction would not violate OFAC regulations, you had to call OFAC and obtain guidance from them about whether or not the party was actually subject to sanctions. We've heard a few horror stories about transactions being held up for days while a bank awaited a call back from OFAC.

It therefore came as good news when OFAC recently announced that it had launched a form on its Web site that will allow a financial institution to submit information about a possible match on an in-process wire transfer. The hope is that this will be a more expedient process. Let us hear how it's working.

The original version appeared in the June 2003 edition of the Oklahoma Bankers Association Compliance Informer.

First published on BankersOnline.com 10/13/03