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UK: AML-REGULATED BUSINESSES NEED TO BRACE FOR ECONOMIC CRIME LEVY (ECL) IMPLEMENTATION

The Economic Crime Levy (ECL), introduced by the UK government to fund the countering of money laundering, will be collected from 2023-2024, based on the revenues reported in the previous year. The ECL will be collected by HMRC (HM Revenue & Customs), FCA (Financial Conduct Authority), and the Gambling Commission, depending on the business they supervise for preventing money laundering.

As defined by HMRC, the ECL "is an annual charge that will affect entities (organisations) who are supervised under the Money Laundering Regulations (MLR) and whose UK revenue exceeds £10.2 million per year." The new levy is regulated, inter alia, by Part 3 of the Finance Act 2022 and the Economic Crime (Anti-Money Laundering) Levy Regulations 2022. In addition, it must be noted that the legal framework is going to be amended through the draft regulation of The Economic Crime (Anti-Money Laundering) Levy (Amendment) Regulations 2023.


HMRC published a policy paper entitled "Get ready for the Economic Crime Levy," providing information about the steps which are necessary to pay the levy, which was updated on the 21st of March 2023. On the 9th of March 2023, the FCA published a piece of news entitled "FCA to collect Treasury’s economic crime levy (Anti-Money Laundering) from July."Further guidance will be delivered by HMRC and other authorities on their website. On the 30th of March 2023, the Gambling Commission published its guidance"Guidance - The Economic Crime Levy: Gambling Commission's guidance on the Economic Crime Levy and how licensed casino operators can prepare for it". See below the hyperlinks to these documents.


The introduction of the ECL has been criticized by some advisers as it emerges from: Jane Matthews, "Advisers criticise FCA economic crime levy roll-out", The Financial Times, March 24, 2023.



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