Anti-bribery compliance programme: The Wolfsberg Group publishes updated guidance

On 17 April, the Wolfsberg Group published a new overview of the key elements of an effective anti-bribery and corruption compliance programme, such as company-wide policy, governance and roles, risk assessment, and control environment establishment. The Ecovis experts know what’s new.

Red flag risk indicators

The report outlines the following red flags of corruption and bribery in financial institutions that may warrant compliance staff conducting enhanced due diligence (EDD):

• An individual or entity makes unreasonable/unsupported objections to ABC due diligence
• The use of a shell company or some other non-transparent corporate structure
• Requests for payment of a commission before or immediately upon award of the contract
• Requests for unusual contract terms
• The use of nominees or proxies with no obvious commercial purpose
• Requests for payment in cash, advance payments, payment to an individual or entity that is not the contracting individual/entity
• Unusual involvement of public officials in commercial matters
• Sudden unexplained resignations of key professionals (e.g., members of the board, lawyers, or auditors)

We will implement an anti-bribery compliance programme for your company.

Inga Karulaitytė, Head of FinTech Group, Attorney at Law, Partner, ECOVIS ProventusLaw, Vilnius, Lithuania

Best practices to mitigate customer and transaction corruption risks

Best practices related to designing and running an ABC compliance programme include:

• Create a company-wide policy to capture key elements of an ABC programme
• Ensure the programme is overseen by senior management
• Periodically assess the nature and extent of the exposure to bribery and corruption risks and the effectiveness of controls designed to mitigate those risks
• Establish risk-based controls that are aligned with the company-wide policy
• Communicate the ABC programme through policies, procedures, and guidance, with risk-based training of relevant employees and certain third parties (where appropriate)

Conclusion

This guidance is not intended to preclude financial institutions from doing business with a customer merely because of a potentially higher risk status. Rather, it is designed to assist institutions in identifying situations where additional measures and controls may be appropriate.

For further information please contact:

Inga Karulaitytė, Head of FinTech Group, Attorney at Law, Partner, ECOVIS ProventusLaw, Vilnius, Lithuania
Email: inga.karulaityte@ecovisproventuslaw.com