We have a business customer (similar to a Dollar General) that is a publicly traded company. Our attempts to identify the signers on the account have run into a snag. The business has told us that as a publicly traded company, by law, they are not obligated to give out personal information on any of its employees which includes signatories on bank accounts. Also that it was a company policy that they don't provide personal information. Any advice on what we should do?

Publicly traded companies are exempt from CIP. The signers on a business account, public or privately owned, are not your customers, the business is. As such, you're not required to CIP them. However, many FI's choose to do so, as it is a sound practice.

At the end of the day, if a customer refuses to comply with your bank policy, you have to determine if this is the type of account you want to keep.

I would like to add that these companies may be exempt from CIP but if you board approved policy does not exempt them (or states that you will CIP everybody) you may have an issue with you examiner/auditor.

Thank you so much! This gives me enough to determine what we need to do next.

The CIP regulation does not say anyone is "exempt" from CIP.

Publicly traded companies listed on a major exchange are specifically excluded from the regulation's definition of "customer." So, the regulation does not require you to identify a publicly traded company listed on a major exchange. Thus, your CIP could indicate that you do not identify publicly traded companies listed on a major exchange. However, if your CIP makes no mention of the issue apparently someone decided that you would identify them.

You are certainly not prohibited from applying your CIP to a publicly traded company listed on a major exchange.

None of that has any bearing whatsoever on whether you identify signatories on a "customers" account. The regulation does not require you to identify a mere signatory under any circumstance. If you do require it's, because your board adopted CIP says you do.

So, the following is BS:



If they do not want to give you the information they are certainly not required to; they can take their business to a bank with lower standards. On the other hand, if your CIP says you must identify signatories, then you will either comply with it or risk being cited for not complying with it.

P.S. The same analysis applies to government entities. I just saw a moronic legal memo from USDA that said banks cannot require identifying information from their employees whom they propose as account signatories. It was BS too.

P.S. The same analysis applies to government entities. I just saw a moronic legal memo from USDA that said banks cannot require identifying information from their employees whom they propose as account signatories. It was BS too.

A few years ago I saw a similar letter. Needless to say (even without extensive BSA I have training since obtained) I sent the perspective customer packing. I was not going to chance opening an account for someone without any ID from a fraud perspective. The shock on the persons face followed by "you must open the account" when shown the door was priceless. On second thought waving by by may not have been appropriate.

Our policy follows the regulation (which as Ken said specifically excludes certain entities from the regulation's definition of customer.). Our procedures ask to CIP everyone.

According to our procedures, the BSA Officer (me) is allowed to make exceptions to the procedure.

For example: In the case of Board Members on an HOA (that change every day I swear), government entity, or publicly traded company - I will make the exception that we only need "enough identifying information to be able to properly identify the person over the phone". This usually means a Security Question, Drivers License, or other identifier. Most of these signers just don't like giving out their full SSN, but are happy to provide the rest for security purposes.


The key here is ... I follow what my policy & procedure says. You'll have to follow what yours says.

I'm not sure what type of exception you are referring too. However, a bank employee cannot be granted permission (even by the board) to make an exception to the board approved CIP program.

An employee can make an exception to Procedures if granted authority to do so.

For example, a branch manager can override placing a hold on a check.


I am not making an exception to our Board Approved Policy. Our policy states we follow the CIP. Which in this case - excludes a publicly traded company from the definition of customer.

Our Procedures ask our new account reps to identify everyone - to make it easier. Should they run into a problem, they must refer the exception to the BSA Officer so I can review our Policy and make a determination.

I do not believe employees can make exceptions to the board approved CIP policy. I believe an examiner will cite you for this, unless the policy provides for exceptions.

Our policy states that for business accounts, reasonable efforts are to be made to identify ALL entities related to a business account or loan. If an entity cannot be identified, the reason must be documented.

At a minimum, we say the following requirements must be met:

If the business is in the form of a legal entity, the identification procedures must be applied to that entity. If the business is not a legal entity and / or the bank is unable to verify the identity of the business in the normal ways, the identification procedures must be applied to each and all signers on the account.

So, our policy has no mention specifically of publicly traded companies and not identifying them so they would be treated just like any other account.

So, I guess we need to evaluate whether we need to adjust our policy at some point so there is less chance of confusion and how to respond to this customer.

Yes. However, the reason they excluded publicly traded companies from the definition of "customer," thereby eliminating the need to apply CIP, was that doing so is pointless. Wal Mart's name, address, and EIN are contained in its' SEC filings. If you did not get the information from them you could get it from their public filings.

However, your CIP is clear in that it applies to all signatories without regard to whether the customer is publicly traded, a bank, a government entity, etc. As noted, the rationale for that is to prevent fraud and the disclosure of information to the wrong people. I see no reduction in that risk just because the customer is publicly traded.

the bank is unable to verify the identity of the business in the normal ways, the identification procedures must be applied to each and all signers on the account.


Confusion - I agree. Could you elaborate on what exactly this means??? You mean if you can't find the corporation that is trying to open an account in your Secretary of State's records, you can just identify the signers on the account and call it good??? That is the way I would read it.

It certainly wasn't FinCEN's finest hour, but they did provide for such a mechanism in the regulation:

(C) Additional verification for certain customers. The CIP must address situations where, based on the bank's risk assessment of a new account opened by a customer that is not an individual, the bank will obtain information about individuals with authority or control over such account, including signatories, in order to verify the customer's identity. This verification method applies only when the bank cannot verify the customer's true identity using the verification methods described in paragraphs (a)(2)(ii)(A) and (B) of this section.

I've never seen anyone actually put it in their policy before. Most just simply say the account will not be opened if the entity cannot be identified.

Ken - I know some banks who use that exact verbiage when they open foreign business accounts and cannot obtain a TIN. They obtain an ID number which is usually off of the appropriate formation document.

Learning experience and definitely room for improvement on our end.

Again, we don't allow exceptions to policy. I was discussing procedures. Examiners have been pleased with my process.

ACB, I don't think we are talking about the same thing.

I was responding to your statement in a previous post that said You have never seen that FinCEN verbiage included in a policy. I was merely stating I do know some banks who use that verbiage to open accounts for foreign business entities which do not have TINs.

They have their policies, you have yours.

At the Bank yours trumps theirs.