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Concrete Analysis | Home buyers, sellers must let estate agents verify their ID documents to comply with anti-money-laundering, counterterrorism laws
- Hong Kong estate agents are legally bound to identify and verify the identity of their customer when handling the sale of a property
- Consumers should be willing to provide the necessary information to their estate agents contribute to the combat of money-laundering
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In order to comply with the requirements of the Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorist Financing Ordinance (AMLO), estate agents must conduct “customer due diligence” (CDD) to identify and verify the identity of their customer when handling the sale and purchase of a property. The Estate Agents Authority (EAA) issued a relevant practice circular on this for the estate agency sector back in 2018.
However, some consumers might still be unaware of the requirements imposed on estate agents under the AMLO and hence unwilling to provide their personal information and/or allow estate agents to retain copies of their identity documents for record.
Here I would like to appeal to property vendors and purchasers to contribute to the combat of money-laundering by providing the necessary information to their estate agents, so that the relevant CDD measures can be completed. Consumers can also rest assured that there are guidelines for estate agents on the collection and protection of their clients’ personal information so that the information collected will be well protected.
As required by the AMLO, estate agents must identify and verify the identity of their customer (regardless of whether he or she is a purchaser or vendor) before establishing any business relationship with them. For this, customers should provide estate agents with the following documents according to their different situations as set out below:
– If the customer carries out a transaction as an individual, estate agents must obtain the customer’s Hong Kong Identity Card or travel document.
– If a representative purports to act on behalf of a customer or there is a beneficial owner in relation to the customer, estate agents must obtain the representative’s or the beneficial owner’s Hong Kong Identity Card or travel document.
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