Australia: AUSTRAC issues first notices to non-enrolled businesses

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Kooky

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AUSTRAC, the regulator of Australia's AML/CTF regime, has issued its first infringement notices to businesses brought under the national regime this year that had not enrolled with it. The trade publication Real Estate Business reported the move on 1 October 2026, saying the notices went to real estate, accounting and jewellery businesses.

The notices concern one obligation only, and the earliest one: enrolment. Under the rules as Real Estate Business describes them, a business must enrol with AUSTRAC within 28 days of first providing a designated service. The businesses that received a notice had not done so. None of them has been named in the reports used for this article, and none is named here.

For real estate agencies the news arrives three months into a regime that is new to the whole profession. The figures published alongside it show a sector that is still part-way through signing up, and a regulator that says most of the businesses it has written to have responded.

Figures as reported by Real Estate Business on 1 October 2026, from AUSTRAC's announcement.

What the regulator did

According to Real Estate Business, AUSTRAC announced that it had begun issuing infringement notices to non-enrolled businesses. The notices are the first of their kind since the AML/CTF regime was widened in the middle of the year.

Three kinds of business are mentioned in the report: real estate, accounting and jewellery. All three belong to the group of sectors that entered the regime on 1 July 2026. Real Estate Business lists that group as real estate, legal services, accounting, conveyancing, trust and company services, and dealers in precious stones and metals.

The reason given for each notice is the same. The business had provided a designated service and had not enrolled within the 28 days that follow. Nothing in the reports suggests that any of the notices rests on a finding about the business's customers or its transactions. They are about a registration step that was not taken.

Neither the number of notices nor the share that went to real estate businesses appears in the material available for this article. The trade press reports that the notices covered the three sectors, without a breakdown.

A point of care on the dates. The report in Real Estate Business is dated 1 October 2026 and the trade title Accountants Daily carries the same story, with a byline date of 2 October. AUSTRAC's own media release could not be opened for this article, so the exact day on which the regulator published it is not confirmed here. The date given in this article is the date of the trade-press report.

How the regulator got here

The notices did not come without warning. Real Estate Business reports that in August 2026 AUSTRAC sent formal requests for information to businesses that appeared to be providing designated services without having enrolled. The requests came before any notice was issued.

The response, by the regulator's account, was wide. About 90 per cent of that initial group have since enrolled or tried to, the report says.

AUSTRAC's chief executive, Brendan Thomas, drew the same line between the many and the few in comments carried by SMS Magazine, a trade title that covered the story on 6 October. "The small number that continue to ignore their obligations should not expect AUSTRAC to ignore them," he said, as quoted by the magazine.

The wording matters for how the news is read. The regulator's own description is of a small number of businesses, set against a first group in which roughly nine in ten have acted. It is a description of an enforcement step taken at the margin, and the reports do not present it as a judgement on a profession.

The fine, and one figure that differs

Real Estate Business gives the amounts as A$21,840 for a company and A$4,368 for an individual. It adds that penalties can accrue for each day a business stays unenrolled, which means that the cost of doing nothing is not fixed at the amount on the first notice.

The two reports do not agree on one of those figures. SMS Magazine prints the amount for an individual as A$4,638, where Real Estate Business prints A$4,368. The two numbers share the same digits in a different order, which suggests a slip in one of the two, but this article cannot say which. AUSTRAC's release, which would settle the point, could not be read. The company figure of A$21,840 appears without a competing value in the material used here.

Whatever the right figure for an individual, the distinction between the two amounts shows how the notices are built: one level for a business run as a company, a lower one for a person. The reports do not say how many notices of each kind were issued.

Where real estate enrolment stands

The same reports carry the most recent counts of who has enrolled. Real Estate Business puts the number of real estate agencies enrolled with AUSTRAC at 18,350 on 1 October 2026, up from 17,970 on 20 August 2026. That is 380 more agencies in six weeks.

The publication sets those numbers against about 45,000 offices nationwide, its own figure for the size of the sector. On that basis, the 18,350 enrolled on 1 October come to about 41 per cent of the total. The comparison needs a caution: the enrolled figure counts agencies and the national figure counts offices, and one agency business can run several offices. The gap between the two numbers is therefore not a count of agencies that have failed to enrol, and the reports do not present it as one.

Accountants Daily gives the equivalent count for its own readers. Accounting and professional services firms enrolled with AUSTRAC rose from 13,550 to 13,780 over the same dates, an increase of 230.

Both lines move in the same direction and at a similar pace. Enrolment did not stop when the first 28 days of the regime ran out; it has continued through August and September, at a few hundred businesses per sector over the six weeks measured. That is consistent with the wording of the rule, which counts the 28 days from the first designated service a business provides, not from 1 July. A business that provides its first such service later has its own, later deadline.

Enrolment is the first of several duties

Enrolment tells the regulator that a business exists and is inside the regime. It is not the whole of what the regime asks. Real Estate Business quotes John Nguyen, founder of AML Partners, making that point: in his words as reported, enrolment is only the first step.

The publication sets out what follows it. A regulated business needs an AML/CTF program and a risk assessment. It has to carry out customer due diligence. It has to report suspicious matters and threshold transactions. It has to train its staff and keep records.

For an agency principal, the practical reading is that the notices reported this month touch the lightest of these duties. Mr Thomas put it in similar terms in the comments carried by SMS Magazine. "Enrolment is a simple first step and there is no excuse for failing to take it," he said.

The scale explains part of the picture. Six groups of businesses joined the regime on the same day. The enrolment counts show that the process of joining is still under way three months later.

How the profession is responding

At least one industry body has run its own briefing. REINSW, a real estate institute, listed a member webinar on the new AML/CTF obligations, in a question-and-answer format, for 7 October 2026, according to the news page of its website. The session fell in the week after the first notices were reported.

For an agency, the practical questions at this stage include whether a given activity counts as a designated service, when the 28 days began for a particular business, and what the program and the risk assessment need to contain. The trade-press reports used here do not answer those questions case by case, and the answer depends on what each business actually does.

One thing the reports do make clear is the order of events the regulator has followed so far. Businesses that appeared to be outside the system first received a request for information. About nine in ten have since enrolled or tried to. The first notices came afterwards.

What comes next

AUSTRAC has said the first notices will not be the last. SMS Magazine reports Mr Thomas saying that the regulator will issue more infringement notices where necessary.

No timetable for further notices appears in the reports, and no figure for how many businesses remain in the group that received a request for information and did not respond. Because penalties can accrue daily, according to Real Estate Business, the position of a business that has received a notice and still has not enrolled changes with each day that passes.

The next published enrolment counts will show whether the pace seen between 20 August and 1 October holds. For real estate, the number to compare is 18,350 agencies. For the amounts of the fines, and the date and full wording of the announcement, the reference remains AUSTRAC's own release, which should be read directly.

Kooky, from Shaka

Kooky edits Agents Estate and builds Shaka, the payment router he made for real estate professionals. One payment comes in, and every agent, agency and party in the deal receives their signed share on closing date.

About Kooky and Shaka →