These scenarios have been developed to help clarify who is responsible for what under the new compliance requirements.

CREA recommends that REALTORS® advise clients of the FINTRAC requirements BEFORE any real estate documents are signed. This is to avoid members being involved in a buyer agency or listing agreement, only to discover the client later refuses to provide the identification information now required by law. A REALTOR® who continues to represent a client who refuses to provide identification information is in non-compliance of the law.

Scenario One
Two individuals are involved – a buyer and a seller. The agent for each must complete the Individual Identification Information Record for their own client. The agent of the buyer must complete the Receipt of Funds Record, even though the deposit may end up in the listing broker’s account. The two agents do not share or exchange reports. The buyer’s agent is required to make reasonable effort to get the information about the listing brokers trust account, where the deposit ended up. Each agent is responsible for filing a suspicious transaction report, if required.

Scenario Two
Two individuals are involved - a buyer and a seller, but one of the individuals is unrepresented. The agent representing a client must complete the Individual Identification Information report for their own client, and take all reasonable measures to also acquire identification information of the unrepresented party and complete the Individual Identification Information Record. If the unrepresented individual refuses to provide the required information, this must be noted on the Record and the agent must also decide whether to send a suspicious transaction report to FINTRAC. If the agent represents the buyer, they must complete the Receipt of Funds record depending on where the deposit ends up. If it goes directly to an unlicensed individual, then a Receipt of Funds Record is not required. If there is no buyer agent, the listing broker would be responsible for the Receipt of Funds record.

Scenario Three
Two individuals are involved – a buyer and a seller, but the same agent is representing both the buyer and the seller. In this case who does what is very clear. In this case it’s that agent who completes the Individual Identification Information Record for the buyer and the seller, and must complete the Receipt of Funds Record.

Scenario Four
There are two individuals involved, and one agent representing the buyer and another the seller. However, the buyer is in another country and will never meet their agent face-to-face. It is the responsibility of the broker representing the buyer to have a contract in place with an agent or mandatary who can then meet the buyer, and verify the identification information. Once that information has been verified, the rest of Scenario One would apply

Scenario Five
Two individuals are involved. The real estate agent is representing the buyer, and the seller is a builder not licenced in the trading of real estate. The deposit goes directly from the buyer to the builder's trust account. In this case the buyer agent completes the Individual Identification Information Record for their own client, and no Receipt of Funds Record would be required.