August timeframe for publication of Guidance for Real Estate Agents

The Department of Internal Affairs will be delaying the publication of the guideline ‘Real Estate Agents – Complying with the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering Financing of Terrorism Act 2009 (AML/CFT Act)’. This is in order to incorporate new regulations currently being consulted on and drafted by the Ministry of Justice.

While the new regulations are small in number they are important and will have an impact on how real estate agents meet their AML/CFT obligations. Rather than having ‘before and after’ versions of the guideline which may result in some confusion DIA have decided to wait until the new regulations have been published online (gazetted) before the guideline is released. This is anticipated to be at the beginning of August 2018. This still provides plenty of time for real estate agents to access the guideline before they are covered by the AML/CFT Act on January 1 2019.

In the meantime DIA suggests that real estate agents make themselves familiar with the following existing guidance which will help them prepare for the AML/CFT Act:

- AML/CFT Risk Assessment Guideline (updated May 2018)

- AML/CFT Programme Guideline (updated May 2018)

- Risk Assessment and Programme: Prompts and Notes for DIA reporting entities (December 2017)

- Phase 2 AML/CFT Risk Assessment 2017 (December 2017)

The Department remains committed to producing high quality guidance material for their reporting entities and helping them meet their AML/CFT obligations.

If you require further discussion/clarification, please feel free to contact us at amlcft@dia.govt.nz

These documents will be reviewed regularly. (via DIA)