The identity check, and why it comes before your listing

Because it is law. The Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Act 2006 (Cth) has applied to banks, casinos and remitters for twenty years. The Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Amendment Act 2024 (Cth), usually called tranche 2, extended it, and from 1 July 2026 it covers real estate agents and business brokers, conveyancers, solicitors, accountants, and trust and company service providers. Your accountant and your solicitor are under the same obligations I am.

The regulator is AUSTRAC, and its guidance is public at austrac.gov.au. There is no small-business exemption, no exemption for a one-person brokerage, and no discretion for me to waive it because you are obviously legitimate.

Buying a legitimate business has long been one of the cleanest ways to wash criminal money. The business absorbs cash, reissues it as trading revenue, and the trail goes cold. That is why brokers were brought in alongside lawyers and accountants rather than singled out. It has nothing to do with you and everything to do with the transaction type being attractive to somebody else.

Two of the designated services matter here: assisting somebody to buy, sell or transfer real property, and assisting somebody to buy, sell or transfer a body corporate or legal arrangement, which is what a share sale of a business is.

The check has to be completed before the service is provided, and preparing and marketing your business is the service. So it happens before your listing goes live, not at contract and not at settlement. A campaign cannot lawfully start without it.

I run them, and they come out of the campaign fee. Once you appoint me and the campaign fee is paid, the searches are run so the customer due diligence obligation under the Act is met. There is nothing separate for you to pay and nothing extra appears on my invoice.

The standard scope is up to two individuals, one company and one trust, for the business being sold. That covers how a Queensland business is usually held.

Where the ownership runs wider than that, you are told the additional cost as soon as I know how the business is structured. It is charged at what it costs me, with nothing added: $15 plus GST for each additional individual and $30 plus GST for each additional company or trust, checked 21 August 2026. It is settled before the listing is advertised. Eleven owners is eleven checks, and that is the structure rather than a decision either of us made.

What I need from you is the documentation, promptly. Your business cannot be advertised for sale until the searches are clear, so this is the step that sets your launch date.

Allow 48 hours to seven days. A single person with a current licence or passport is the quick end. A company or trust with several beneficial owners is the slow end, particularly where a trust deed has to be read line by line. Gather these first and it goes through in days rather than weeks. Every name has to match the legal name on the document exactly, because a mismatch is what stalls it.

• Everyone: a current Australian driver licence or passport, plus a second form such as a Medicare card.
• If a company owns the business: the ACN and full registered name, and details for every director and every shareholder holding 25% or more.
• If a trust is involved: the trust deed and any deeds of variation, the trustee details, and the beneficiaries or the class of beneficiaries.
• If it is a partnership: the partnership agreement and details for each partner.
• If your name has changed: the marriage certificate or change of name certificate that links the two.

Start it the day you decide to go ahead, not the week you want to be live. Nothing else in the campaign is held up by it if it is done first, and everything is held up by it if it is left last.

I keep a record that you were verified, for seven years, because the Act requires it. What that record holds is set out in the privacy policy: your name, date of birth and address, the document type, its number and its expiry. It is never used for marketing, never shared with a buyer, and never used to assess you commercially. The privacy policy sets out how identity documents are handled.

Then I can't act, and neither can anyone else operating lawfully. Any broker who tells you the checks are optional, or who wants to leave them until a contract is signed, is telling you something about how they run their business.