Processing International Payments

By John Swindells 04 May 2007 | Comment
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This is an exerpt of a message I received from Smile, regarding international money transfers:

As from the start of business Monday 14th May 2007, there will be a change to the way international payments are processed.

The USA Government requires that all international transfers processed through the USA be provided with all the transfer details. As all SWIFT payments worldwide are processed through the USA, any SWIFT transfer requested by you will have the full transfer details disclosed to the USA Government. This also applies to TIPANET payments that are sent to the USA.

The Data Protection Authority in Belgium has ruled that this is a breach of the Data Protection Directive and so the sender of the money must be made aware of this and be given the option not to proceed with the transfer if they are not in agreement to this sharing.

If you need to send a SWIFT payment to anywhere in the world or a TIPANET payment to the USA, you will need to agree to a declaration about how the transfer details could be used.

The processing institution will need you to agree to the declaration each time you do a SWIFT payment to anywhere in the world or a TIPANET payment to the USA. Unfortunately, they can't process your request in these circumstances without your agreement to the declaration.

TIPANET payments to other parts of the world and euroCHAPS are not affected by this change.

Below is the declaration that you need to agree to each time you request a SWIFT payment to anywhere in the world or a TIPANET payment to the USA:

'In order to make this payment, personal information relating to the individuals involved in the transfer may be processed for the purposes of:

a) Complying with applicable laws, including without limitation anti-money laundering and anti-terrorism laws and regulations,
And
b) Fighting crime and terrorism,

And disclosure to any Government entity, regulatory authority or to any person we reasonably think necessary for these purposes. This may mean that personal information will be transferred outside the EEA to countries, which do not provide the same level of data protection as the UK.

I agree to the above: Yes/No? (Delete as appropriate)'

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