Customer Due Diligence(CDD) : Individuals

This post is based on RBI Master Circular dated Feb 25, 2016 updated on Jan 04, 2024 


Part I - Customer Due Diligence (CDD) Procedure in case of Individuals


For undertaking CDD, REs shall obtain the following from an individual while establishing an account-based relationship or while dealing with the individual who is a beneficial owner, authorised signatory or the power of attorney holder related to any legal entity:

(a)    the Aadhaar number where,

 (i) He is desirous of receiving any benefit or subsidy under any scheme notified under section 7 of the Aadhaar (Targeted Delivery of Financial and Other subsidies, Benefits and Services) Act, 2016 (18 of 2016); or

(ii) He decides to submit his Aadhaar number voluntarily to a bank or any RE notified under first proviso to sub-section (1) of section 11A of the PML Act; or

(aa) the proof of possession of Aadhaar number where offline verification can be carried out; or

(ab) the proof of possession of Aadhaar number where offline verification cannot be carried out or any OVD or the equivalent e-document thereof containing the details of his identity and address; or

(ac) the KYC Identifier with an explicit consent to download records from CKYCR; and

(b)   the Permanent Account Number or the equivalent e-document thereof or Form No. 60 as defined in Income-tax Rules, 1962; and

(c)    such other documents including in respect of the nature of business and financial status of the customer, or the equivalent e-documents thereof as may be required by the RE: Provided that where the customer has submitted,

 i) Aadhaar number under clause (a) above to a bank or to a RE notified under first proviso to sub-section (1) of section 11A of the PML Act, such bank or RE shall carry out authentication of the customer’s Aadhaar number using e-KYC authentication facility provided by the Unique Identification Authority of India. Further, in such a case, if customer wants to provide a current address, different from the address as per the identity information available in the Central Identities Data Repository, he may give a self-declaration to that effect to the RE.

ii) proof of possession of Aadhaar under clause (aa) above where offline verification can be carried out, the RE shall carry out offline verification.

iii) an equivalent e-document of any OVD, the RE shall verify the digital signature as per the provisions of the Information Technology Act, 2000 (21 of 2000) and any rules issues thereunder and take a live photo as specified under Annex I.

iv) any OVD or proof of possession of Aadhaar number under clause (ab) above where offline verification cannot be carried out, the RE shall carry out verification through digital KYC as specified under Annex I.

v) KYC Identifier under clause (ac) above, the RE shall retrieve the KYC records online from the CKYCR in accordance with Section 56.

 

Provided that for a period not beyond such date as may be notified by the Government for a class of REs, instead of carrying out digital KYC, the RE pertaining to such class may obtain a certified copy of the proof of possession of Aadhaar number or the OVD and a recent photograph where an equivalent e-document is not submitted.

Provided further that in case e-KYC authentication cannot be performed for an individual desirous of receiving any benefit or subsidy under any scheme notified under section 7 of the Aadhaar (Targeted Delivery of Financial and Other subsidies, Benefits and Services) Act, 2016 owing to injury, illness or infirmity on account of old age or otherwise, and similar causes, REs shall, apart from obtaining the Aadhaar number, perform identification preferably by carrying out offline verification or alternatively by obtaining the certified copy of any other OVD or the equivalent e-document thereof from the customer. CDD done in this manner shall invariably be carried out by an official of the RE and such exception handling shall also be a part of the concurrent audit as mandated in Section 8. REs shall ensure to duly record the cases of exception handling in a centralised exception database. The database shall contain the details of grounds of granting exception, customer details, name of the designated official authorising the exception and additional details, if any. The database shall be subjected to periodic internal audit/inspection by the RE and shall be available for supervisory review.

Explanation 1: RE shall, where its customer submits a proof of possession of Aadhaar Number containing Aadhaar Number, ensure that such customer redacts or blacks out his Aadhaar number through appropriate means where the authentication of Aadhaar number is not required as per proviso (i) above.

Explanation 2: Biometric based e-KYC authentication can be done by bank official/business correspondents/business facilitators.

Explanation 3: The use of Aadhaar, proof of possession of Aadhaar etc., shall be in accordance with the Aadhaar (Targeted Delivery of Financial and Other Subsidies Benefits and Services) Act, 2016 and the regulations made thereunder.





Accounts opened using Aadhaar OTP based e-KYC, in non-face-to-face mode, are subject to the following conditions:

i.                    There must be a specific consent from the customer for authentication through OTP.

ii.                  As a risk-mitigating measure for such accounts, REs shall ensure that transaction alerts, OTP, etc., are sent only to the mobile number of the customer registered with Aadhaar. REs shall have a board approved policy delineating a robust process of due diligence for dealing with requests for change of mobile number in such accounts.

iii.                The aggregate balance of all the deposit accounts of the customer shall not exceed rupees one lakh. In case, the balance exceeds the threshold, theaccount shall cease to be operational, till CDD as mentioned at (vi) below is complete.

iv.                The aggregate of all credits in a financial year, in all the deposit accounts taken together, shall not exceed rupees two lakh.

v.                  As regards borrowal accounts, only term loans shall be sanctioned. The aggregate amount of term loans sanctioned shall not exceed rupees sixty thousand in a year.

vi.                Accounts, both deposit and borrowal, opened using OTP based e-KYC shall not be allowed for more than one year unless identification as per Section 16 or as per Section 18 (V-CIP) is carried out. If Aadhaar details are used under Section 18, the process shall be followed in its entirety including fresh Aadhaar OTP authentication.

vii.              If the CDD procedure as mentioned above is not completed within a year, in respect of deposit accounts, the same shall be closed immediately. In respect of borrowal accounts no further debits shall be allowed.

viii.            A declaration shall be obtained from the customer to the effect that no other account has been opened nor will be opened using OTP based KYC in nonface-to-face mode with any other RE. Further, while uploading KYC information to CKYCR, REs shall clearly indicate that such accounts are opened using OTP based e-KYC and other REs shall not open accounts based on the KYC information of accounts opened with OTP based e-KYC procedure in non-faceto-face mode.

ix.                REs shall have strict monitoring procedures including systems to generate alerts in case of any non-compliance/violation, to ensure compliance with the above mentioned conditions.

 

REs may undertake V-CIP to carry out:

 

i) CDD in case of new customer on-boarding for individual customers, proprietor in case of proprietorship firm, authorised signatories and Beneficial Owners (BOs) in case of Legal Entity (LE) customers.

 

Provided that in case of CDD of a proprietorship firm, REs shall also obtain the equivalent e-document of the activity proofs with respect to the proprietorship firm, as mentioned in Section 28 and Section 29, apart from undertaking CDD of the proprietor.

ii) Conversion of existing accounts opened in non-face to face mode using Aadhaar OTP based e-KYC authentication as per Section 17.

iii) Updation/Periodic updation of KYC for eligible customers. REs opting to undertake V-CIP, shall adhere to the following minimum standards:

(a) V-CIP Infrastructure

i) The RE should have complied with the RBI guidelines on minimum baseline cyber security and resilience framework for banks, as updated from time to time as well as other general guidelines on IT risks. The technology infrastructure should be housed in own premises of the RE and the V-CIP connection and interaction shall necessarily originate from its own secured network domain. Any technology related outsourcing for the process should be compliant with relevant RBI guidelines. 59Where cloud deployment model is used, it shall be ensured that the ownership of data in such model rests with the RE only and all the data including video recording is transferred to the RE’s exclusively owned / leased server(s) including cloud server, if any, immediately after the V-CIP process is completed and no data shall be retained by the cloud service provider or third-party technology provider assisting the V-CIP of the RE.


ii) The RE shall ensure end-to-end encryption of data between customer device and the hosting point of the V-CIP application, as per appropriate encryption standards. The customer consent should be recorded in an auditable and alteration proof manner.

iii) The V-CIP infrastructure / application should be capable of preventing connection from IP addresses outside India or from spoofed IP addresses. iv) The video recordings should contain the live GPS co-ordinates (geo-tagging) of the customer undertaking the V-CIP and date-time stamp. The quality of the live video in the V-CIP shall be adequate to allow identification of the customer beyond doubt. v) The application shall have components with face liveness / spoof detection as well as face matching technology with high degree of accuracy, even though the ultimate responsibility of any customer identification rests with the RE. Appropriate artificial intelligence (AI) technology can be used to ensure that the V-CIP is robust.


vi) Based on experience of detected / attempted / ‘near-miss’ cases of forged identity, the technology infrastructure including application software as well as work flows shall be regularly upgraded. Any detected case of forged identity through V-CIP shall be reported as a cyber event under extant regulatory guidelines.


vii) 60The V-CIP infrastructure shall undergo necessary tests such as Vulnerability Assessment, Penetration testing and a Security Audit to ensure its robustness and end-to-end encryption capabilities. Any critical gap reported under this process shall be mitigated before rolling out its implementation. Such tests should be conducted by the empanelled auditors of Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In). Such tests should also be carried out periodically in conformance to internal / regulatory guidelines.


viii) The V-CIP application software and relevant APIs / webservices shall also undergo appropriate testing of functional, performance, maintenance strength before being used in live environment. Only after closure of any critical gap found during such tests, the application should be rolled out. Such tests shall also be carried out periodically in conformity with internal/ regulatory guidelines.

(b) V-CIP Procedure

i) Each RE shall formulate a clear work flow and standard operating procedure for V-CIP and ensure adherence to it. The V-CIP process shall be operated only by officials of the RE specially trained for this purpose. The official should be capable to carry out liveness check and detect any other fraudulent manipulation or suspicious conduct of the customer and act upon it.


ii) Disruption of any sort including pausing of video, reconnecting calls, etc., should not result in creation of multiple video files. If pause or disruption is not leading to the creation of multiple files, then there is no need to initiate a fresh session by the RE. However, in case of call drop / disconnection, fresh session shall be initiated.


iii) The sequence and/or type of questions, including those indicating the liveness of the interaction, during video interactions shall be varied in order to establish that the interactions are real-time and not pre-recorded.


iv) Any prompting observed at end of customer shall lead to rejection of the account opening process.


v) The fact of the V-CIP customer being an existing or new customer, or if it relates to a case rejected earlier or if the name appearing in some negative list should be factored in at appropriate stage of work-flow.


vi) The authorised official of the RE performing the V-CIP shall record audio-video as well as capture photograph of the customer present for identification and obtain the identification information using any one of the following:


a) OTP based Aadhaar e-KYC authentication

b) Offline Verification of Aadhaar for identification

c) KYC records downloaded from CKYCR, in accordance with Section 56, using the KYC identifier provided by the customer

d) Equivalent e-document of Officially Valid Documents (OVDs) including documents issued through DigiLocker RE shall ensure to redact or blackout the Aadhaar number in terms of Section 16.


In case of offline verification of Aadhaar using XML file or Aadhaar Secure QR Code, it shall be ensured that the XML file or QR code generation date is not older than three working days from the date of carrying out V-CIP.


Further, in line with the prescribed period of three working days for usage of Aadhaar XML file / Aadhaar QR code, REs shall ensure that the video process of the V-CIP is undertaken within three working days of downloading / obtaining the identification information through CKYCR / Aadhaar authentication / equivalent e-document, if in the rare cases, the entire process cannot be completed at one go or seamlessly. However, REs shall ensure that no incremental risk is added due to thisvii) If the address of the customer is different from that indicated in the OVD, suitable records of the current address shall be captured, as per the existing requirement. It shall be ensured that the economic and financial profile/information submitted by the customer is also confirmed from the customer undertaking the V-CIP in a suitable manner. viii) RE shall capture a clear image of PAN card to be displayed by the customer during the process, except in cases where e-PAN is provided by the customer. The PAN details shall be verified from the database of the issuing authority including through DigiLocker.


ix) Use of printed copy of equivalent e-document including e-PAN is not valid for the V-CIP.


x) The authorised official of the RE shall ensure that photograph of the customer in the Aadhaar/OVD and PAN/e-PAN matches with the customer undertaking the V-CIP and the identification details in Aadhaar/OVD and PAN/e-PAN shall match with the details provided by the customer.


xi) Assisted V-CIP shall be permissible when banks take help of Business Correspondents (BCs) facilitating the process only at the customer end. Banks shall maintain the details of the BC assisting the customer, where services of BCs are utilized. The ultimate responsibility for customer due diligence will be with the bank. xii) All accounts opened through V-CIP shall be made operational only after being subject to concurrent audit, to ensure the integrity of process and its acceptability of the outcome. xiii) All matters not specified under the paragraph but required under other statutes such as the Information Technology (IT) Act shall be appropriately complied with by the RE.

(c) V-CIP Records and Data Management

 

i)                    The entire data and recordings of V-CIP shall be stored in a system / systems located in India. REs shall ensure that the video recording is stored in a safe and secure manner and bears the date and time stamp that affords easy historical data search. The extant instructions on record management, as stipulated in this MD, shall also be applicable for V-CIP.

ii)               The activity log along with the credentials of the official performing the V-CIP shall be preserved.


Financial Inclusion

CDD of Small account holders

Notwithstanding anything contained in Section 16 and as an alternative thereto, in case an individual who desires to open a bank account, banks shall open a ‘Small Account’, which entails the following limitations:

 i. the aggregate of all credits in a financial year does not exceed rupees one lakh;

ii. the aggregate of all withdrawals and transfers in a month does not exceed rupees ten thousand; and

iii. the balance at any point of time does not exceed rupees fifty thousand. 68Provided, that this limit on balance shall not be considered while making deposits through Government grants, welfare benefits and payment against procurements.

Further, small accounts are subject to the following conditions:

 

(a) The bank shall obtain a self-attested photograph from the customer.

(b) The designated officer of the bank certifies under his signature that the person opening the account has affixed his signature or thumb impression in his presence.

 

Provided that where the individual is a prisoner in a jail, the signature or thumb print shall be affixed in presence of the officer in-charge of the jail and the said officer shall certify the same under his signature and the account shall remain operational on annual submission of certificate of proof of address issued by the officer in-charge of the jail.

 

(c) Such accounts are opened only at Core Banking Solution (CBS) linked branches or in a branch where it is possible to manually monitor and ensure that foreign remittances are not credited to the account.

(d) Banks shall ensure that the stipulated monthly and annual limits on aggregate of transactions and balance requirements in such accounts are not breached, before a transaction is allowed to take place.

(e) The account shall remain operational initially for a period of twelve months which can be extended for a further period of twelve months, provided the account holder applies and furnishes evidence of having applied for any of the OVDs during the first twelve months of the opening of the said account.

(f) The entire relaxation provisions shall be reviewed after twenty-four months.

(g) Notwithstanding anything contained in clauses (e) and (f) above, the small account shall remain operational between April 1, 2020 and June 30, 2020 and such other periods as may be notified by the Central Government

(h) The account shall be monitored and when there is suspicion of money laundering or financing of terrorism activities or other high-risk scenarios, the identity of the customer shall be established as per Section 16 or Section 18.

(i) Foreign remittance shall not be allowed to be credited into the account unless the identity of the customer is fully established as per Section 16 or Section 18.

Simplified procedure for opening accounts by Non-Banking Finance Companies (NBFCs): In case a person who desires to open an account is not able to produce documents, as specified in Section 16, NBFCs may at their discretion open accounts subject to the following conditions:

(a) The NBFC shall obtain a self-attested photograph from the customer.

(b) The designated officer of the NBFC certifies under his signature that the person opening the account has affixed his signature or thumb impression in his presence.

(c) The account shall remain operational initially for a period of twelve months, within which CDD as per Section 16 or Section 18 shall be carried out.

(d) Balances in all their accounts taken together shall not exceed rupees fifty thousand at any point of time.

(e) The total credit in all the accounts taken together shall not exceed rupees one lakh in a year.

(f) The customer shall be made aware that no further transactions will be permitted until the full KYC procedure is completed in case Directions (d) and (e) above are breached by him.

(g) The customer shall be notified when the balance reaches rupees forty thousand or the total credit in a year reaches rupees eighty thousand that appropriate documents for conducting the KYC must be submitted otherwise the operations in the account shall be stopped when the total balance in all the accounts taken together exceeds the limits prescribed in direction (d) and (e) above.

(h) The account shall be monitored and when there is suspicion of ML/TF activities or other high-risk scenarios, the identity of the customer shall be established as per Section 16 or Section 18.

KYC verification once done by one branch/office of the RE shall be valid for transfer of the account to any other branch/office of the same RE, provided full

KYC verification has already been done for the concerned account and the same is not due for periodic updation.


Part II - CDD Measures for Sole Proprietary firms

 

For opening an account in the name of a sole proprietary firm, CDD of the individual (proprietor) shall be carried out.

In addition to the above, any two of the following documents or the equivalent e-documents there of as a proof of business/ activity in the name of the proprietary firm shall also be obtained:

(a) Registration certificate including Udyam Registration Certificate (URC) issued by the Government

(b) Certificate/licence issued by the municipal authorities under Shop and Establishment Act

(c) Sales and income tax returns

(d) CST/VAT/ GST certificate

(e) Certificate/registration document issued by Sales Tax/Service Tax/Professional Tax authorities

(f) IEC (Importer Exporter Code) issued to the proprietary concern by the office of DGFT or Licence/certificate of practice issued in the name of the proprietary concern by any professional body incorporated under a statute

(g) Complete Income Tax Return (not just the acknowledgement) in the name of the sole proprietor where the firm's income is reflected, duly authenticated/acknowledged by the Income Tax authorities

(h) Utility bills such as electricity, water, landline telephone bills, etc. In cases where the REs are satisfied that it is not possible to furnish two such documents, REs may, at their discretion, accept only one of those documents as proof of business/activity. Provided REs undertake contact point verification and collect such other information and clarification as would be required to establish the existence of such firm, and shall confirm and satisfy itself that the business activity has been verified from the address of the proprietary concern


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