KYC FOUNDATIONS

Course Syllabus
Audience
ACAMS KYC Foundations focuses on research skills—how to better assess,
explore, organize, and present—in the context of customer due diligence.
The primary target is the frontline analyst, teaching skills that benefit new
and experienced employees, especially as regulator expectations increase
regarding beneficial owners. This course assumes the employer has
already introduced that organization’s unique roles, processes, systems,
and common cases. It will use only generic forms or processes that won’t
conflict with each organization’s own. To bring all learners to a shared
baseline of terminology, concepts, and processes, the course starts with
the “KYC Foundations: Essentials” video and then builds from there.

The course is written and presented by due diligence experts working

around the world. It pulls examples from many countries, and is globally
appropriate. The lessons and examples are relevant to any industry. A
primary focus is “financial institutions,” including banks, credit unions,
insurance, MSB, securities broker-dealers, credit card issuers, alternate
payment systems, etc.

Course Structure
This entire course is self-paced for you to complete at your own
convenience. ACAMS allows you 4 calendar weeks to complete 4 hours
of coursework, including a final assessment. You will be guided using a
learning path on ACAMS’ learning management system (LMS). Follow
carefully all instructions. 4 weeks from the course start date your access
expires.

To successfully complete this course and earn the certificate, you must pass
a short assessment. The assessment contains 20 questions. The minimum
passing score is 80% and multiple attempts are allowed. When you pass,
your certificate will be available in the learning path itself and ACAMS will
automatically add 4 CAMS credits to your profile.

Technical Requirements:
The course is compatible with most operating systems and browsers to
make it easy to participate. The ACAMS Learning Management System
(LMS) is https://lms.acams.org. Contact your organization’s IT department
for assistance.

© 2020 ACAMS. All Rights Reserved. KYC CDD AML course syllabus
This information is subject to change. Updated 08August2020 1
Behavioral outcomes of this course:
• Describe the importance of KYC, “Know Your Customer”, the benefits
of a risk-based approach, and the recommended KYC process

• Assess what you already know, and what you need to know, about your
customer

• Explore where you can find answers to your questions

• Organize the customer information to make it meaningful

• Present the customer information in a manner appropriate to your

audience

Course content
Getting started
• Introduction

• Instructions

• The Trocca case

• What would you do?

• Feedback

• Learning objectives

KYC Essentials
• Why KYC?

• KYC is intended to manage risk

• Who is your customer?

• Definition of a customer

• Types of customers in financial services

• Risk overview

• Types of risk: Regulatory, legal, financial, reputational

© 2020 ACAMS. All Rights Reserved. KYC CDD AML course syllabus
This information is subject to change. Updated 08August2020 2
 • Regulations related to KYC

• Risk categories

• Categories of risk: Customer, jurisdiction, product, channel

• Customer risk and red flags

• Politically exposed person risk and red flags

• Shell company risk and red flags

• Jurisdiction risk and red flags

• Product risk and red flags

• Product risk and red flags (Case example)

• Channel risk and red flags

• Risk-based approach

• Risk-based approach to business

• Controlling risk

• Residual risk equation

• Risk-based approach to KYC (initial and ongoing)

• KYC process overview

• Following organization-specific policies and procedures

• Four research steps

• Duty to report

• Tipping off

• Review

Assess
• Introduction to the Assess step

• Assess: To ask, plan, and prepare

• What do we need to know about our customer?

© 2020 ACAMS. All Rights Reserved. KYC CDD AML course syllabus
This information is subject to change. Updated 08August2020 3
 • Three lines of defense

• Who reads the KYC customer profile, and why?

• What do we already know about the customer?

• Data security and privacy

• Levels of due diligence

• Customer identification process

• Customer identification process for a natural person

• Customer identification process for a legal person

• Documentary verification: Primary and secondary

• Non-documentary verification: Primary and secondary

• Documentary verification: Primary and secondary (Knowledge

check)

• Beneficial ownership

• Beneficial ownership

• Beneficial ownership: Legal arrangements

• Beneficial ownership: Vs control

• Beneficial ownership: Vs control (Knowledge check)

• Beneficial ownership: How to calculate

• Beneficial ownership: How to research

• Customer due diligence

• CDD for a natural person

• CDD for a natural person (Case example)

• CDD for a PEP (Case example)

• CDD for a legal person

• CDD for a legal person (Case example)

• CDD for a shell company (Case example)

© 2020 ACAMS. All Rights Reserved. KYC CDD AML course syllabus
This information is subject to change. Updated 08August2020 4
 • Risk-based escalation

• Enhanced due diligence

• EDD for a natural person

• EDD for a natural person (Case example)

• EDD for a legal person

• EDD for a legal person (Case example)

• What do we still need to know about the customer?

• How much research is reasonably enough?

• Risk-based escalation (Accept / Reject / Do more diligence)

(Reminder)

• Review

Explore
• Introduction to the Explore step

• Explore (to investigate, search, and interview)

• Evaluating sources of customer information

• Criteria for selecting standard customer research sources

• Sources especially useful for enhanced customer research

• Conducting focused internet searches

• Internet search

• Internet search: Techniques and taxonomies

• Internet search (Case example)

• Name screening

• Internet search: Sanctions screening

• Internet search: Proprietary databases

• Internet search: Adverse media checks

© 2020 ACAMS. All Rights Reserved. KYC CDD AML course syllabus
This information is subject to change. Updated 08August2020 5
 • Internet search: Adverse media checks (Knowledge check)

• Offline research

• Conducting personal interviews

• Conducting site visits

• Documentation

• Documenting your research

• Data security and privacy (Reminder)

• Review

Organize
• Introduction to the Organize step

• Organize (to gather, align, collect, and clarify)

• Filter what customer information is relevant and important

• Risk-based escalation (Accept / Reject / Do more research)

(Reminder)

• Determine the customer’s risk rating

• Risk-based approach to business (Reminder)

• Risk-rating by applying your institution’s policies and tools

• Review

Present
• Introduction to the Present step

• Present (to document, persuade, and defend)

• Producing a customer profile

• Who reads the KYC customer profile, and why? (Reminder)

• Customer profile structure and format

• Data security and privacy (Reminder)

© 2020 ACAMS. All Rights Reserved. KYC CDD AML course syllabus
This information is subject to change. Updated 08August2020 6
 • How much research is reasonably enough? (Reminder)

• Risk-based escalation (Accept / Reject) (Reminder)

• Maintaining the customer profile

• Transaction monitoring and ongoing reviews

• Review

• Conclusion

Thank you

© 2020 ACAMS. All Rights Reserved. KYC CDD AML course syllabus
This information is subject to change. Updated 08August2020 7