AML compliance screening support for New Zealand teams

A reporting entity is rarely criticised for reaching the wrong conclusion about a customer. It is criticised for being unable to show how the conclusion was reached: which checks were performed, on what date, by whom, and against which sources. That is the gap most compliance functions carry. The screening happens across several tools and a shared inbox, and the evidence of it ends up as a folder of screenshots with no consistent structure.

intelID addresses the enquiry half of that problem. Company registration, directors, shareholders, registered office and filing history come from MBIE and Companies Office data. Ownership can be traced through related entities to the individuals recorded behind them. Property and title data, PPSR registrations and insolvency events provide the enhanced due diligence layer that a higher-risk customer or an unusual transaction requires. Credit reporting data is available where the entity holds a lawful authorised purpose for it under the Credit Reporting Privacy Code 2020.

The output is one consolidated result per enquiry with the sources identified, rather than five exports that an analyst has to reconcile by hand. For onboarding at volume, that shortens the time between a customer being accepted and the file being complete. For periodic review, it makes re-checking an existing counterparty a single task rather than a project.

A comprehensive New Zealand media archive of newspapers, magazines and public notices, and published court, tribunal and regulatory decisions, cover the reported and adjudicated history of a counterparty.

Also available: individual and commercial credit checks from Centrix and Equifax, and sanctions, watchlist, politically exposed person and adverse media screening. Both are set out on the data sources page.

A counterparty file usually starts with a company and director search to establish the entity, its status, its officers and the shareholding recorded behind it. Where the transaction involves real property, a property and title search confirms registered ownership and the interests already registered against it. A PPSR search shows security interests over personal property, and an insolvency search shows whether a formal process is already on foot.

For the individuals behind an entity, corroboration is the work rather than verification in a formal sense. An identity confirmation enquiry tests whether the person presenting the file is consistent across several licensed records, and an address history search establishes the address position over time rather than the address a customer supplied. Higher-risk files add asset searches where the source of funds needs testing.

Entity and officer data comes from the Companies Office register maintained by MBIE. Registered ownership and interests in land come from Land Information New Zealand. Security interests in personal property come from the Personal Property Securities Register, and formal insolvency events from the Insolvency and Trustee Service. Each source and the legal basis attaching to it is listed on the data sources page.

Due diligence obligations do not displace the Privacy Act 2020. Collection must be for a lawful purpose connected with the entity's functions and limited to what that purpose needs, so the enquiry should track the risk being tested rather than everything the platform can reach. Where credit reporting information is involved, the Credit Reporting Privacy Code 2020 adds its own restrictions on access and use, and the declared basis is recorded against the query. A screening or registry result is an input to a risk decision, not a finding about a person.

1. Declare the authorised purpose for the file, for example customer due diligence on a new counterparty.
2. Resolve the entity: registration, status, directors, shareholders, registered office and address for service.
3. Trace ownership through related entities until the individuals recorded behind the structure are identified.
4. Corroborate those individuals against address and identity records rather than relying on the details supplied.
5. Add the enhanced layer where the risk rating calls for it: property and title, PPSR, insolvency and asset position.
6. Export the consolidated result and the audit record into the customer file, dated, so the periodic review has a baseline to compare against.

A new corporate counterparty is presented for onboarding. The company search returns a recent change of directors and a holding company as majority shareholder. A second search on the holding company identifies the individuals recorded behind it, one of whom is also recorded against a company subject to an insolvency event. A PPSR search returns registered interests over the trading company's plant. None of that determines the risk rating. It is passed to the compliance officer with the dated audit record so the enhanced due diligence decision is made on evidence rather than on the customer's own description. No customer, entity or outcome is described here.

Compliance teams are held to a standard of demonstrable control, so a tool that quietly allows unlimited access to personal information creates risk rather than removing it. intelID requires an authorised-purpose declaration before results are returned on every search, and records it with the user, the timestamp and the sources queried. The log cannot be edited by the person who created it.

Role-based access lets an MLRO give analysts a narrower reach than senior staff, and allows access to be withdrawn immediately when a person changes role. Data is encrypted in transit and at rest, hosted on Google Cloud Platform, and handled under a vendor security programme benchmarked to SOC 2 Type II providers. Subject data is not used for marketing, is never resold, and is never exposed to public indexing. The full position is set out on the compliance page and the security page.

Subject data is not used for marketing, is not resold, and is not exposed to public indexing. How a trace runs end to end is on the skip tracing page, the workflow on the platform page, every integrated source and its legal basis on the data sources page, hosting and encryption on the security page, and the statutory position on the compliance page. Pricing is a monthly subscription plus a per-search fee, published on the pricing page. intelID treats the audit record as part of the search rather than an optional report.

Accounts are issued to named, verified individuals only, with reach set by role, so an analyst, a compliance officer and the MLRO need not hold the same access. Pricing is a monthly subscription plus a per-search fee, published on the pricing page, and access is requested through the request access page.

Company and director searches, PPSR searches, insolvency searches and authorised-purpose controls.

Director privacy changes and what they mean for company searches and authorised purpose under the Privacy Act 2020.