In mid September the FCA lead for financial crime, Stephen Smart, spoke at the Law Society's economic crime conference. It seems to be the start of their engagement with the solicitors profession about their anticipated approach to AML regulation when they take that over from the SRA. He acknowledged that there needs to be more engagement and that they needed to win the trust of the legal profession. There would me more engagement over the coming months. Good. It need to happen.

Some clarity about the timetable. The Financial Services and Markets Bill is currently going through parliament and should receive royal assent early 2028. That will start the process with the FCA assuming responsibility for regulating AML compliance from the end of 2028. That will start the transition period which will end in 2030.

How many solicitors firms are affected? As of April 2025, 5,569 firms fell within the scope of the money laundering regulations. More than 1,000 of these firms had just one practising solicitor.

It should be remembered that it is not just affecting solicitors. It is also affecting the accountancy profession and many others - a total of 22 professional bodies. The goal is to create a single, unified professional services supervisor to improve consistency and enforcement.

Stephen Smart said: "‘We will not take a one-size-fits-all approach [and] we will not be overloading firms with requests and paperwork. We will be creating friction for criminals but letting everyone get on with their business… We can do it with a proportionate, predictable and technology-enabled approach." He talked about working in partnership and not wanting a 'them and us' approach.

(A lot of this information is courtesy of this LS Gazette)

AML Support From Us

We provide a lot of AML support to businesses in the Legal Sector. Please see below for a summary and links for further information. (Watch this space for assistance coming for certain businesses in the Financial Services sector as well.)

• AML Training
• AML Policy Documents & PWRA Review (PWRA is Practice Wide Risk Assessment)
• Independent AML Audit
• AML Updating Retainer
• Office Procedures Manual (OPM) 
• SRA Audit or Inspection on AML - we help firms with this. Charged at £200/hr. It is best to contact us as soon as you receive notification from the SRA. They will ask you to answer some preliminary questions and submit your policies for review. How you answer them can help or hinder how the audit or inspection goes.
• AML & Sanctions Manual
• On-Line CPD Training Courses - Click▶Pay▶Watch▶Quiz▶Certificate.

(Sanctions Regime compliance - see separate services for this on our website.)

Contact Us

Feel free to contact us, ideally by using the 'How can we help you?' form below.