To Ask or Not to Ask: That Is the Compliance Question

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Thanks to Sir William Shakespeare, the long-pondered question “to be or not to be” has been applied to many situations. When you’re tired but busy, you might ask yourself, “to sleep or not to sleep.” When you want to make an expensive purchase, you may think, “to buy or not to buy.” But in the world of compliance, there is really no room for a Shakespearean debate … the answer is most certainly to always ask the questions.

So why is it that credit union staff shy away from asking members questions? What’s so stressful about confirming their identity or the validity of a high-dollar transaction? The conundrum arises because many credit union staff look at these questions as bothersome to members. But let’s look at them for what they really are. Some of them are a requirement but, in the end, they are a quick and easy way to protect the members, the staff and the credit union from fraud and other risks. No one on either side wants to deal with loss due to fraud later on down the road, right?