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What is a Risk Assessment?
Client Risk Assessment (CRA) is a process where lawyers have to evaluate the potential risks posed by their new, and existing clients.
The goal is to ensure compliance with Anti-Money Laundering (AML) regulations and protect the firm from legal and reputational damage.
Typically this process is done through Word or Excel. Everyone absolutely hates doing it. It involves a lot of data migration across various platforms.
To give you some context on how big of a problem this is, 90% of AML fines last year for the legal market were all risk assessment related. Refer to this article where I’ve listed a table of fines and explain why this is the biggest problem in the legal market.
In this article we are going to look at some of the providers that offer risk assessment modules as part of their solution.
I’ve asked these providers to help me understand their tool by giving me a demo and some screenshots so I could create this article for you.
Without any further fluff, let’s jump into it:
1) Amiqus
Amiqus‘s Risk Assessment
Category | Details |
---|---|
Founded | 2015 |
Staff | 63 |
Location | Scotland, UK |
Payment Structure | PAYG, Minimum commitment – £250 per month |
Key Features | KYB, KYC, Screening, Recruitment DBS Checks, Right to Work, Right to rent, Credit checks, Risk Assessment, Open Banking |
Strengths | 1) Strong comprehensive offering for onboarding UK individuals and simple entities. 2) Platform is deep, easy to use and covers all your AML needs! 3) Whilst the risk assessment module is not the greatest, it is still better than Word or Excel. Also Amiqus is widely endorsed across Scotland, that is due to being consumer friendly and always updating the platform. |
Examples of their Risk Assessment:
2) Zygos
Zygos‘s Risk Assessment
Category | Details |
---|---|
Founded | 2015 |
Staff | 17 |
Location | Global clientele; focus on CSPs & Law in offshore jurisdictions |
Payment Structure | Subscription based on number of users (around €55) |
Key Features | Comprehensive Practice management software including Billing, KYB, KYC, Screening, Ongoing Monitoring, Client Risk Assessment, Corporate / Entity Administration and Management, Litigation management/workflow |
Strengths | 1) Comprehensive, easy to use and affordable; you can run your entire practice on it. 2) Everything is customisable; risk scores, questions, sections, workflows, practice flows. 4) Since all of your client and practice data sits in one platform, it makes life a lot easier and saves you tons of money on purchasing multiple solutions. |
Examples of their Risk Assessment:
3) First AML
First AML‘s Risk Assessment
Category | Details |
---|---|
Founded | 2017 |
Staff | 93 |
Location | UK, NZ, AU |
Payment Structure | Multi tier with minimum commitment (they don’t serve SMEs) |
Key Features | KYB, KYC, Screening, Ongoing Monitoring, Client Risk Assessment, Matter Risk Assessment, Manifest |
Strengths | 1) Market leading KYB/KYC journey 2) Very good client and matter risk assessment module with risk scoring, template, for different practices 3) Can read and unwrap Trusts, bulk remediation capabilities, highly customisable platform |
First AML has yet to provide any screenshots on this product.
4) Validient
Validient‘s Risk Assessment
Category | Details |
---|---|
Founded | 2021 |
Staff | 7 |
Location | UK |
Payment Structure | Multi tier and affordable rates |
Key Features | KYB, KYC, Screening, Ongoing Monitoring, Client Risk Assessment, Matter Risk Assessment, Firm Wide Risk Assessment, Questionnaires and E-Sig! |
Strengths | 1) Customisable Risk Assessments, well built. with audit trails, ability to leave comments, add, amend or retract questions and download report as PDF 2) The Risk Assessments are dynamic; allowing teams to create their own templates, questions (multiple choices, drop downs, etc) share the file with a senior member for review and sign-off. 3) The questionnaire functionality allows you to collect your CRA answers directly from the client. Also have a great review feature for sign offs. |
Examples of their Risk Assessment:
Risk Assessment Tab on client file (notice they also have SARS)
Creating a template risk assessment (they have text, multiple choices, etc)
What it looks like when your answering the questions
Generating a PDF or sending it for review (pretty cool option)
The review options
5) Xama
Xama‘s Risk Assessment
Category | Details |
---|---|
Founded | 2012 |
Staff | 7 |
Location | UK |
Payment Structure | Subscription Cost Per Client and PAYG Checks (No minimums or credit purchases) |
Key Features | KYC, UK KYB, Risk Assessment, Screening, Ongoing Monitoring |
Strengths | 1) House a library of templates, create condition based rules to drive uniformity when risk grading clients 2) Cost effective and easy to use platform. Integrates with literally everything 3) Dynamic questions to avoid filling out unnecessary questions (e.g. “what is the clients’ trading name” will only appear if “does the client trade under any other name?” is answered “Yes”. |
Examples of their Risk Assessment:
6) Firmcheck
Firmcheck‘s Risk Assessment
Category | Details |
---|---|
Founded | 2012 (UK Launch 2023) |
Staff | 22 |
Location | UK, NZ |
Payment Structure | Subscription Cost Per Client and PAYG Checks (No minimums or credit purchases) |
Key Features | KYC, UK KYB, Risk Assessment, Screening, Ongoing Monitoring |
Strengths | 1) Multiple risk assessment templates for different entity types e.g. Companies. 2) Very easy to use verification flow that takes you through the entire process. 3) Lots of risk settings and review option for one or multiple reviewers |
Examples of their Risk Assessment:
7) AML HQ
AML HQ‘s Risk Assessment
Category | Details |
---|---|
Founded | 2022 |
Staff | 5 |
Location | Ireland & UK |
Payment Structure | Free to sign up and trial! Tier based subscription, very affordable. |
Key Features | KYC, UK KYB, Client Risk Assessment, Firmwide Risk Assessment, Screening, Ongoing Monitoring |
Strengths | 1) The onboarding flow is an absolute breeze! 2) 0 set up required to jump and try the platform! 3) Has both Firm Wide and Client Risk Assessments, ability to upload and the CRA is very easy to use and part of the verification flow |
Examples of their Risk Assessment: