The giving and receiving of gifts, entertainment, and hospitality can be perceived as a conflict of interest and bribery risk which can expose organisations to regulatory scrutiny, penalties, and reputational damage. Therefore, firms must have a gift and hospitality policy to mitigate misconduct risk and processes to monitor gifts, entertainment and hospitality transactions and activities proactively.
Employees should be fully aware of the rules and regulations they are beholden to and that the acceptance of gifts and entertainment could compromise their duty to act in the client’s best interest.
Compliance is responsible for making sure there are no blind spots in the compliance program and monitoring, documenting, and addressing real or potential conflicts of interest.
The components of effective GEH management are not a novelty for Compliance, but it has changed since employees started to work from home or are more dispersed across different locations. That’s why firms should be looking at building the best approach to monitoring and auditing disclosures of gifts, meals, entertainment, travel and hospitality given and received.
If you don’t have this part of your compliance program automated, you are delimiting your compliance team from effectively monitoring GEH transactions.
Solutions like MyComplianceOffice support integrations with HR systems, demonstrate appropriate and correct oversight and enhance employee accountability by creating and setting reminders to employees regarding the gifts policy requirements, sending the right message to employees regarding their responsibilities.
If you want to know more about anti-bribery and corruption in Asia, understand what MyComplianceOffice can do for your firm and learn how MCO customers use our solution to reduce bribery risk, this webinar is for you.
Join Kelly-Ann McHugh, our Asia-Pacific Director, and Helen H. Chan, Regulatory Intelligence Expert, Thomson Reuters for a session that covers: