AML Compliance: The Rules That Make Yousend a Trusted Financial Partner

Introduction

When you use Yousend for your cross-border remittance, you’re relying on more than just an app; you’re using a globally certified financial partner.

Our legal title changes based on the country, but our mission to protect your money never does:

• In Canada, we are a regulated Money Service Business (MSB).
• In the UK, we are an authorized Payment Institution (PI).
• For transfers to Nigeria and Kenya, we are licensed International Money Transfer Operators (IMTOs) and Money Remittance Businesses under the strict eye of the CBN and CBK.

Regardless of the name, our operations are defined by one crucial set of regulations: Anti-Money Laundering (AML) Compliance. This framework is the ultimate reason your money is safe, secure, and arrives instantly.

This guide will demystify AML, showing you precisely how these mandatory rules function as your primary defense system, transforming Yousend from a simple app into a highly regulated and trusted financial partner for the global diaspora.

AML vs. KYC

Understanding AML starts with clarifying its relationship with its famous partner, KYC:

• AML (Anti-Money Laundering): AML is the overarching program designed to prevent criminal organizations from disguising illegally obtained funds. It is the entire set of systems and procedures aimed at achieving this goal through prevention, detection, and reporting.
• KYC (Know Your Customer): KYC is a specific process within the larger AML framework. Its function is to verify customer identification, proving who you are and assessing your initial risk level before a business relationship begins.

In essence, KYC is how we get to know you, and AML is how we use that information to keep the financial system clean, together.

The Three Pillars of Yousend’s AML Compliance Program

A robust AML program, such as the one implemented by Yousend, operates continuously across three integrated, mandatory stages set by global regulators:

Pillar 1: Customer Due Diligence (CDD)

This involves creating a comprehensive, risk-assessed profile for every customer, extending far beyond the initial ID check.

• Risk-Based Approach (RBA): Yousend evaluates every customer based on criteria like geography, occupation, and expected transaction behavior. This allows our resources to focus on higher-risk activity, such as unusually large international payments or transfers to high-risk zones.
• Sanction and PEP Screening: Every user is instantly screened against major global sanctions lists (including those from the UN, UK, EU, and US) and checked for links to Politically Exposed Persons (PEPs). This mandatory check ensures funds are not supporting illicit actors or organizations.
• Enhanced Due Diligence (EDD): For any high-risk activity (e.g., large-volume global money transfer, suspicious or unusual customer behaviour, suspicious or unusual transaction patterns), EDD is triggered. This requires additional documentation, such as proof of source of funds, to provide maximum assurance of legitimacy and maintain regulatory compliance.

Pillar 2: Continuous Transaction Monitoring (CTM)

This is the technology engine that actively monitors the flow of money in real-time, detecting anomalies that human reviewers might miss.

• Behavioral Analytics: Our advanced systems build a “normal” transaction profile for you (e.g., sending money from Canada to Kenya every two weeks). If a sudden transaction deviates sharply—such as an attempt to send money instantly for ten times your average amount to a brand-new beneficiary—the system instantly flags it.
• Threshold and Structuring Detection: The system automatically flags transactions that breach regulatory reporting limits. Crucially, it also detects “structuring”—where criminals break large, illicit sums into multiple small ones to evade detection—ensuring the clean status of our entire money transfer app network.
• Fraud Pattern Recognition: Using Machine Learning (ML), our systems detect known fraud and money mule patterns, providing a dynamic defense against evolving criminal tactics.

Pillar 3: Regulatory Reporting and Audits

The final pillar of AML compliance involves external transparency and accountability.

• Suspicious Transaction Reports (STRs): If a transaction is flagged and our internal compliance team has reviewed the transactions, overall customer activity, and has determined the activity is suspicious, a mandatory report (STR) is filed with the relevant national financial intelligence unit (FIU), such as FINTRAC in Canada or the Nigerian Financial Intelligence Unit (NFIU).
• Audit Trails: Every single international money transfer transaction, along with its associated KYC documentation and monitoring history, is recorded and stored securely for a mandatory period (at least five years). This ensures Yousend can provide a complete, traceable audit trail to regulators like FINTRAC upon request.

Why Compliance is Trust: Yousend’s Regulatory Commitment

Yousend does not choose where to be compliant; we are legally bound to follow the strictest rules of every jurisdiction in which we operate. This commitment ensures safety across all our major corridors:

• United Kingdom (UK): We adhere to the stringent Money Laundering Regulations enforced by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and, National Crime Agency (NCA) upholding the high standards of global finance.
• Canada: We maintain meticulous record-keeping and reporting mandates set by FINTRAC, which monitors every best way to transfer money internationally transaction leaving Canada.
• Nigeria & Kenya: Our systems are built to align with the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) & Nigerian Financial Intelligence Unit (NFIU) and the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) & Financial Reporting Centre (FRC) AML directives, ensuring that funds sent from the diaspora are safe, legal, and compliant upon arrival.

This rigorous regulatory adherence is the core reason you can trust Yousend: it means your funds will never be delayed, frozen, or jeopardized due to non-compliance on our part.

Conclusion

For Yousend, AML compliance is far more than a regulatory tick-box; it is one of the most important, technology-driven investments in your safety and the integrity of the financial system.

By actively running advanced transaction monitoring and adhering strictly to the mandates of global regulators, Yousend ensures that we prevent money laundering, protect the funds of the diaspora, and maintain the clean, secure channel you deserve.