REB Business Empowerment Showcase: Compliant on paper v compliant in practice: Is your AML program actually keeping your business safe?

A month on from "AML Day", most agencies have ticked the visible boxes: enrolled with AUSTRAC, named a compliance officer, and sent staff through initial training. But ticking those boxes isn't the same as running a program that actually holds up and keeps your business safe. On this REB Business Empowerment Showcase, Liam Garman sits down again with Kaan Yuksel, managing director and founder of Visibl, to explore the gap between compliance on paper and compliance in practice, and how agencies can close it. Yuksel explains what "paper compliance" really looks like in reality: an AML program written once and left on a shelf, staff who've done the bare minimum training, and a compliance officer who hasn't built the habit of actually engaging with their own program. The conversation turns practical, covering how agencies can build compliance into everyday workflows, from sending KYC verification alongside listing agreements, to making AML a standing item in team and business meetings, and why encouraging staff to raise red flags, even ones that turn out to be nothing, matters more than getting it right every time. Garman and Yuksel also revisit the penalties for getting it wrong, from AUSTRAC fines through to the reputational fallout in a trust-based industry, before Yuksel shares his advice for agencies still finding their feet a month into the regime.