Small Business Reading Room

Wednesday, October 20, 2004

CYA with FBI, State, Treasury, CIA, Commerce...

A representative of the United States Treasury's Office of Foreign Asset Control lectured to incorporation agents attending the Delaware Division of Corporations' Strategic Planning Conference about our obligations under Federal Law. (See our statement of compliance in a previous post).

It turns out that there are more than half a dozen departments of the Federal Government that publish lists of persons, businesses and even boats that we are prohibited from doing business with.

Agencies that publish prohibited persons' lists:

US Treasury Office of Foreign Asset Control (OFAC)

Department of Commerce

Department of State

Office of the President

Department of Labor

Department of Treasury, Other

Federal Bureau of Investigation

Central Intelligence Agency

The only known way to comply with the regulations is to purchase and use screening software. Our research so far indicates the software varies widely in quality and usefulness of the results. Prices for this software range from $1,000.00 per year on up.

The Federal Government has been working for about a year to compile a master list of names. This effort has, so far, yielded nothing. While we agree that compliance is our responsibility, we think the government has a responsibility to make compliance less burdensome.

Any business with ties to the United States should research its responsibility under the various laws and regulations of the departments and agencies listed above.

We would like to thank our friends at Federal Express for screening all of our shipments.

posted by Larry at 3:05 PM - permalink 0 comments

Small Business Reading Room

CYA with FBI, State, Treasury, CIA, Commerce...

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