What if one of the parties is resident or registered overseas?

This will not usually be a problem provided they have an account at a UK bank authorised by the Prudential Regulatory Authority (PRA) or suitably authorised by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA).

If in doubt this can usually be confirmed by the account IBAN number which should appear on the bank statement. If the IBAN number starts with GB it will be a UK bank account. Where the UK bank is a branch of an overseas bank further checks may be required in accordance with our Anti-Money Laundering Policy.

In the case of overseas entities, the applicant will have to submit official entries from the regulators of the overseas jurisdiction confirming the directors, shareholders, nominees, etc of every entity in the chain of ownership together with ID documents of all controlling individuals. In our experience this can be a very long chain with links in several jurisdictions.

Until we start the process, we have no way of telling how many entities or individuals will be involved and we will ask for a payment on account to cover abortive KYC investigations. This currently stands at £1,500 plus VAT.