AML/CTF Requirements from 1 July 2026
Important Update: Anti-Money Laundering/Counter-Terrorism Financing (AML/CTF) Requirements from 1 July 2026
As of 1 July 2026 an important regulatory change has been made that affects accounting, tax and business advisory firms across Australia.
Under the new framework, accounting firms are required to enrol with AUSTRAC (the Australian Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre) and comply with a range of AML/CTF obligations when providing certain designated services.
The professional designated services include:
- providing a registered office address or principal place of business address for a company or trust;
- assisting in the planning, creation or restructuring of a company or trust;
- assisting in organising, planning, or executing a financial transaction on behalf of an entity;
- acting, or arranging for someone to act, in an official role for a company or trust;
- assisting with a sale, purchase or transfer of legal property;
- selling or transferring a shelf company;
- using a trust account.
This means there may be additional steps involved when we provide these designated services, including requests for information and documentation to meet our regulatory obligations. We may be required to ask you to: verify your identity; verify the identity of relevant individuals (such as directors, trustees, shareholders, etc); identify the beneficial ownership of companies, trusts and other entities; verify the source of funds for particular transactions; and understand the purpose of certain transactions or structures.
These requirements are not limited to a one‑off check. Under the AML/CTF framework, we will have ongoing monitoring obligations. This means we may need to periodically review and update the information we hold about you throughout the course of our engagement.
To reflect these new requirements, we have updated our Terms of Engagement to include provisions relating to AML/CTF compliance. We will only request information where required and will aim to integrate these steps as efficiently as possible into our existing processes.
