Recently, mainland media reported that the status of the customer accounts of many internal banks in Shenzhen area showed that they were frozen, and they could not withdraw or transfer funds. It was rumored that they were cooperating with the local public security to combat money laundering and other activities. If I am in Hong Kong, what will cause the Hong Kong bank account to be frozen?
According to Article 105 of the Basic Law of Hong Kong, "The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region shall protect the rights of acquisition, use, disposal and inheritance of private and legal person property in accordance with the law." As for business ownership and foreign investment, both are protected by law. However, the bank account may be frozen under the following circumstances:
The bank account is idle for a long time and useless
If the account has not been used for a long time, the bank will freeze the account, but the customer only needs to bring his ID card to the bank counter in person to "unfreeze" the account, and then resume all account-related banking services. In order to prevent the bank account from being frozen due to long-term inactivity, banks will advise customers to "depress" the account regularly, such as withdrawals, transfers, etc.
Suspected of "money laundering"
If the police suspect that a certain property of a certain person is obtained from illegal activities, commonly known as "money laundering", the police can apply to the bank to temporarily freeze the relevant bank accounts of the relevant person. If the police find no evidence later, the court will not allow it to continue. Freeze the relevant bank account. In addition, the bank's anti-money laundering monitoring system will issue an alert if there are frequent large-scale unidentified fund transfers in and out of customer accounts. Under normal circumstances, the bank will call the customer for verification. If the customer fails to provide a reasonable explanation and supporting documents to explain that the inflow and outflow of funds are not money laundering activities, the bank will freeze the account.
Involved in criminal activity
Article 43 of Hong Kong's "Hong Kong National Security Law" stipulates that the Police Department of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Government may take various measures when handling national security crime cases endangering national security, including freezing, restricting, confiscating and Forfeiture of related property, etc. In addition, if a person's bank account is suspected to be involved in any criminal activity, the bank also has the opportunity to freeze the relevant account.
Unable to contact the account holder
The bank will regularly check whether the account holder's information is correct and valid, or will call for verification on certain suspicious transactions. The bank also has the opportunity to freeze the relevant account. Therefore, as a bank customer, it is best to regularly check whether your personal information is correct and valid, and update it regularly. In this case, you only need to go to the bank to update the information, and it can be "unfrozen" in general.
The purpose of the account is different from the time of declaration
When opening a business account, the bank will inquire about the company's business nature, account opening purpose, approximate monthly transaction amount and other information from the customer. If the bank finds that the actual usage of the account is very different from the information when applying for opening an account, it may freeze the account. . Generally, it only needs to update the information and provide supporting documents to prove that it does not involve high-risk, money laundering and criminal activities, and it can be "unfrozen".
Source: Yahoo
