I don't think that the levels of demands for compliance on AML / Tax evasion are any different to the rest of the savings/investment market.
Huge pressure on product providers to have everything in order as audits are common.
Service is going to suffer if customers are contacting you to execute transactions and a few elements of the AML are outstanding. Had no reason to contact State Savings until recently (since 2008) and they basically had no information on me at all. Yes, there were delays, duplication (IMHO) and question marks about whether they read what I sent in at all but it's probably no different to the experieces of a lot of customers of other financial institutions. In the words of the FSPO in last years report : It is clear that many of the consumers making complaints to this Office could have had their complaints addressed by their provider, at an earlier point in time. In general, if a provider wants to improve their service, it has to get worse before it gets better as they take a good person out of the line to train a few new people.
Attached is a typical application for a savings/investment product via a Life Assuarance company. The level of information required may seem onerous, but that's where we're at. It doesn't matter if you provide proof of address (or ID) today if the dates have expired next time you want to do a transaction. You have to go through the process again. Plus, some proofs of address like TV Licence, mobile phone bill and what may appear like a bill but is really an invoice will not be sufficent. Proof of PPS. No. is the only one that you have to provide once. Source of wealth (and the account the money came from) has to be provided on each transaction.