Completing a Suspicious Activity Report (SAR)

Reporting Forms

If you are not reporting electronically via SAR Online, please use the SOCA preferred forms for the manual reporting of Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs), as detailed below:

Disclosure Appendix 1 – Source Registration Document (18.79 kB PDF)

Disclosure Appendix 2 – Disclosure Report Details (10.74 kB PDF)

Disclosure Appendix 3 – Subject Detail (9.54 kB PDF)

Disclosure Appendix 4 – Additional Details (15.41 kB PDF)

Disclosure Appendix 5 – Transaction Details (10.71 kB PDF)

Disclosure Appendix 6 – Reason for Disclosure (16.95 kB PDF)

Disclosure Appendix 7 – Limited Intelligence Value (LIV) Report (20.56 kB PDF)

Disclosure Appendix 8 – Reason for Disclosure (Continuation) (18.17 kB PDF)

Guidance Notes

The following guidance notes are applicable to both manual reporting and electronic SAR Online reporting.

There are also further Guidance Notes (48.28 kB PDF) for all the available fields.

What information should I include in a SAR?

SARs provide information and intelligence to Law Enforcement Agencies (LEAs) which help them prevent, detect, investigate and prosecute crimes.  The information is predominantly used in relation to financial crime and money laundering but can also be helpful in relation to other criminal activity.

The content and quality of a SAR can affect the UKFIU’s ability to prioritise and process the report and LEAs’ decision or ability to investigate. Often a seemingly irrelevant piece of information can become a valuable piece of intelligence.

To make SAR information as useful as possible to LEAs, try to answer these six basic questions:

• Who?
• What?
• Where?
• When?
• How?
• Why?

You may not always have full details concerning the subjects of your reports, especially in circumstances where you are reporting on subjects who are not your clients - customers, suppliers, and so on are all potential SAR subjects as well..

The more identifying information and explanation of suspicions provided in a SAR, the greater the likelihood the UKFIU will be able to match the data to other intelligence and put it to active use.

Therefore, if possible, please include:

• Subject’s full name, date of birth and address(es), including postcode.
• Subject details, such as National Insurance numbers, vehicle registration, driving licence, passport, phone numbers, website addresses.
• Details of occupation/employer.
• Details of any associates of the subject.
• Company details, including full legal name and designation, e.g. Limited, plc, or the relevant term if non-UK  (SA in Spain, GmbH in Germany etc). Also DHSS registration number (tax reference and VAT number if available), country of incorporation, addresses, phone numbers, email addresses, website addresses etc.
• If appropriate to your business, include the subject’s account number/policy numbers and transaction details (including recipient account details).
• Subject type,  e.g. perpetrator, victim, or unknown where their role in the activity is unclear.
• If consent is required and why, and any deadlines.

It is important the relevant information is completed within the appropriate fields, and is not merely placed within the ‘Reasons for Suspicion’ field.

In addition to this information, please include a full reason for your suspicion, providing a concise and focused explanation of why the activity is unusual or suspicious, including:

• date of activity
• type of product or service
• how activity will or has taken place, and
• the reason for suspicion.

Please do not speculate on the offence as this often influences who will investigate the SAR, and can be misleading. Please use plain English and avoid legal, technical or sector specific terms.

Example 1: “I am not suspicious of this client but I am making this report anyway”.  There must be a suspicion.

Example 2: “Cash transaction £7,000”. What is the suspicion? Cash on its own is not suspicious, but merely an indicator. Look to what you know about the client, reasons for cash etc. What type of business are you conducting for your client?

Example 3: “Account/Business/Purchase is not being conducted in the usual manner”. What is the usual manner? Why is this unusual?

It is important the relevant information is completed within the appropriate fields and not merely placed within the 'Reasons for Suspicion' field.

There are a number of fields that should be completed in order for a report to be accepted by SOCA. These fields are:

• Your reference (even if none)
• Disclosure type (new or update)
• Source identity
• Source outlet identity
• Today's date
• (Main subject) surname or company name
• Reasons for suspicion.