As a small business owner, there are many regulations that you need to be both aware of and attentive to. One of the most important is the money laundering laws. Money laundering is the process of introducing cash from illegal transactions into a legitimate financial system to make it look as though it's legitimately earned money. Your company can be held criminally liable for money laundering that happens within your business, so you need to know how to prevent it and watch for it.

Be Mindful Of Cash Transaction Amounts

The Internal Revenue Service requires business owners to report any large-scale cash transactions, which means anything over $10,000. You have to fill out a form and submit it to the IRS any time you accept cash in this sum or greater because they want to be informed of where this money is coming from.

Remember that this only applies to cash transactions, not anything paid by check, money order, or traveler's checks. The financial institution that issues things like money orders or traveler's checks is legally bound to notify the IRS any time someone purchases $10,000 worth or more of money orders or traveler's checks, so you won't have to report those.

Make Sure You Know The Details Of Transactions

When it comes to sales and accounting, you need to know the details of every transaction. If there's a large transaction on your books and someone is hesitant to provide the details of what it was for or who the actual investor was, that's a key warning sign.

Further, if you have any transactions on your books that come with very specific and out-of-the-ordinary requests, those are worth looking into as well. You should never allow things like this to stay on your books without investigating them.

Consult A Professional

If you have any reason to believe that there's something untoward going on with your company's accounting and customer transactions, it's in your best interest to consult a professional right away. Reach out to an AML contractor who specializes in money laundering investigations and forensic accounting. He or she can research the details of these transactions and help you determine if they are, in fact, questionable.

In addition, he or she will also let you know when you're facing a situation where you need to notify the IRS about a questionable transaction. That way, you can avoid any potential federal problems that may arise. For more information, contact a company like Burns Risk Management.

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