Department News COMPLIANCE
Common CTR Issues By Bryan Bradley, CRCM, Vice President of Compliance Services
The pandemic may have slowed many of us down, but independent Bank Secrecy Act reviews must go on. MBA Compliance Services staff has noted some common issues when reviewing banks’ Currency Transaction Reports. Te following highlights some of the more common issues noted, along with suggested guidance based on frequently asked questions from the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (
fincen.gov/fequently-asked-questions-regarding-fincen-currency- transaction-report-ctr).
Issue #1 Item 20 of Part I requests the “form of identification used to verify identify” for the person or entity identified. We have noted some banks are routinely marking the “unknown” box when reporting on an entity.
In short, if the bank has identity verification documents on file for the entity named in Part I, then it must identify this identification on the CTR in Item 20.
Te answer to FinCEN’s FAQ #21 states, in part: “FinCEN expects, however, that financial institutions will provide the most complete filing information available within each report, regardless of whether or not the individual fields are deemed critical for technical filing purposes. Examples of ‘forms of identification’ for an entity could include the entity’s business license or incorporation documents. Please refer to 31 CFR § 1010.312 for additional information on identification requirements.”
Issue #2 Another common issue noted is when to mark the “Aggregated transactions” box for Item 24 in Part II. FinCEN’s FAQ #27 clarifies the three conditions that all must be met to prompt the need to mark the aggregated transactions box, which are as follows. “1) (T)he financial institution did not identify any of the individuals conducting the related transactions, 2) all of the transactions were below the reporting requirement, and 3) at least one of the aggregated transactions was a teller transaction.”
Te FAQ answer also provides the following example. “For example, if there were four $3,000 deposits made into ABC Restaurant’s business account in one business day, and the filing institution did not identify any of the individual transactors, and at least one of these deposits was made via a teller transaction, the filing institution would complete a Part I on ABC Restaurant checking Item 3 ‘Multiple transactions’ and checking ‘Aggregated transactions’ in Item 24.”
Conclusion In addition to the FinCEN FAQs, we also would recommend that the bank’s BSA officer obtain and retain a current version of FinCEN’s Currency Transaction Report Electronic Filing Requirements User Guide. Te most current version is XML Schema 2.0, which is available at
https://bsaefiling.fincen.treas. gov/docs/XMLUserGuide_FinCENCTR.pdf.
This article is for information purposes and does not contain or convey legal advice. The information should not be used or relied upon in regard to any particular situation without consultation with your bank attorney. MBA Compliance Services and its Compliance Force program information, call 573-636-8151.
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