2024-21079. Agency Information Collection Activities; Proposed Renewal; Comment Request; Renewal Without Change of Purchases of Bank Checks and Drafts, Cashier's Checks, Money Orders, and Traveler's Checks

Table 1—Distribution of Financial Institutions Covered by This Notice, by Type of Financial Institution

Type of financial institution	Number of financial institutions
Banks	10,062
Banks with a Federal functional regulator (FFR)	a  9,462
Banks lacking an FFR	b  600
Principal MSBS—Issuers/Sellers of Money Orders/Traveler's Checks c	13,145
Principal MSBs—Issuers/Sellers of Money Orders Only	11,764
Principal MSBs—Issuers/Sellers of Money Orders and Traveler's Checks	1,318
Principal MSBs—Issuers/Sellers of Traveler's Checks Only	63
Total	23,207
a  This estimate of the total number of banks with an FFR, including credit unions, is based on end of year 2023 data as provided by each of the FFRs, respectively. The FFRs are the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, and the National Credit Union Administration.
b  This estimate of active entries as of year-end 2023 was derived in consultation with staff from the Internal Revenue Service's Small Business/Self-Employed Division and incorporates data from both public and non-public sources, including: Call Reports; various State banking/financial institution regulators' websites and directories; the Federal Reserve Board of Governors' Master Account and Services database ( https://federalreserve.gov/​paymentsystems/​master-account-and services-database-exisiting-access.htm); and data from the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico Oficina del Comisionado de Instituciones Financieras (OCIF).
c  This number is derived from data as self-reported by MSBs identified as active at year-end 2023 in FinCEN's publicly available MSB registration database. FinCEN, MSB Registrant Search, available at https://www.fincen.gov/​msb-state-selector (downloaded Feb. 28, 2024).

( print page 76189)

In connection with a variety of initiatives FinCEN is undertaking to implement the AML Act, FinCEN intends to conduct, in the future, additional assessments of the PRA burden associated with BSA requirements.

Part 2. Annual PRA Burden and Cost

The scope of the annual PRA burden and cost estimates in this renewal encompasses the incremental recordkeeping requirements for FinCEN purposes that are associated with the issuance or sale of bank checks and drafts, cashier's checks, money orders, and traveler's checks between $3,000 and $10,000, inclusive. FinCEN continues to assign an estimate of the incremental annual average hourly burden of creating and maintaining records for the issuance or sale of bank checks and drafts, cashier's checks, money orders, or traveler's checks to individual purchasers when the sale involves currency between $3,000 and $10,000, inclusive, that is approximately seven and a half hours per covered financial institution, irrespective of the volume of such transactions.^[13] This estimate covers the expected average incremental recordkeeping burden for FinCEN purposes of (1) verifying the identity of depository accountholder and other customers purchasing bank checks and drafts, cashier's checks, money orders, or traveler's checks when the issuance or sale involves currency between $3,000 and $10,000, inclusive; and (2) creating and maintaining records of certain information for a minimum of five years to be made available to the Secretary upon request.^[14]

FinCEN's estimate of the total annual PRA burden (174,053 hours) includes the recordkeeping requirements being renewed in this notice, detailed in table 2 below:

Table 2—Distribution of Estimated Total Annual Burden Hours of Maintaining Recordkeeping Requirements for Issuance/Sale of Bank Checks and Drafts, Cashier's Checks, Money Orders, or Traveler's Checks

Affected financial institution type	Number of financial institutions	Average annual burden estimate per financial institution in hours	Total annual burden hours
Banks	10,062	7.5	75,465
Issuers/sellers of money orders	11,764	7.5	88,230
Issuers/sellers of money orders and traveler's checks	1,318	7.5	9,885
Issuers/sellers of travel checks	63	7.5	473
Total annual burden hours			174,053

( print page 76190)

FinCEN is utilizing the same fully loaded composite hourly wage rate of $106.30 utilized in the 2024 notices of proposed rulemaking (NPRMs) entitled Customer Identification Programs for Registered Investment Advisers and Exempt Reporting Companies and Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism Programs, as well as in recent 60-Day Notices to renew OMB control numbers corresponding to specific BSA regulations.^[15]

The total estimated cost of the annual PRA burden is $18,501,833.90, as reflected in table 3 below:

Table 3—Estimated Total Cost of Annual PRA Burden

Regulatory requirement	Burden hours	Wage rate	Total cost
Verifying and maintaining records	174,053	$106.30	$18,501,833.90
Total annual cost			18,501,833.90