A sanctions check on a company has six steps: pick the lists that apply, search each one, search every name the company uses, check who owns it, read the result, and record what you found. The official search tools are free. The work is in doing every step and keeping the record.
If you want to skip the manual steps for one company, our free check searches eight official lists, including OFAC, UK, EU and UN, in one go. The steps below show what that check does, so you can do it yourself or judge any tool you use.
Step 1: pick the lists that apply to you
There is no single global sanctions list. Each government publishes its own, and your obligations follow where you are and how you trade. Our guide to what a sanctions list is explains who publishes what.
A quick rule:
- US business: OFAC's lists. Add the export lists on the Consolidated Screening List if you ship goods or software abroad.
- UK business: the UK Sanctions List. Add OFAC if you deal in US dollars or with US partners.
- Australian business: DFAT's Consolidated List.
- New Zealand business: MFAT's Russia Sanctions Register and the UN list.
- Anyone trading with EU companies: the EU consolidated list as well.
If you are outside the US and unsure about OFAC, read does OFAC apply to non-US companies?
Step 2: search each official list
These are the official places to run a sanctions search on a company.
| List | Where to search | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| OFAC SDN and non-SDN lists (US) | Sanctions List Search | Fuzzy search with a score slider. Searches all OFAC lists at once. |
| US export lists | Consolidated Screening List | Combines Commerce, State and Treasury lists, including the BIS Entity List. |
| UK Sanctions List | Search the UK Sanctions List | The FCDO's search service. The UK publishes one list for all UK designations. |
| EU consolidated list | EU financial sanctions file | A download. The EU Sanctions Map is useful for regimes but is not a legal source. |
| UN Security Council list | UN Consolidated List | A download and a search page for the UN lists. |
| Australia | DFAT Consolidated List | An Excel download. You search it yourself. |
| New Zealand | Russia Sanctions Register | A download from MFAT. |
Each of our list guides explains its own tool in more detail: OFAC, US export lists, UK, EU, UN, Australia and New Zealand.
Step 3: search every name the company uses
Searching the wrong name is the easiest way to miss a match. Search each of these separately:
- The registered legal name, without the suffix (search "Northwind Trading", not "Northwind Trading LLC"). Suffixes such as Ltd, LLC, GmbH and OOO vary between lists.
- Trading names and brands on invoices, websites and bank details.
- Former names, if the company has been renamed. Lists keep old names as aliases.
- Transliterations. Names from Cyrillic, Arabic or Chinese scripts can be spelled several ways in English. Try the main variants, and use the fuzzy search setting.
Keep the fuzzy or minimum-score setting moderate. An exact-match search misses spelling variants. A very low setting returns pages of noise.
Step 4: check who owns the company
A name search finds listed names. It does not find a company that is unlisted but owned by someone who is.
OFAC's 50 Percent Rule treats a company as blocked if one or more blocked persons own 50% or more of it, directly or indirectly, in total. The UK and EU tests differ. They look at whether a designated person owns more than 50% or controls the company, and the UK does not normally add together the holdings of separate designated persons unless they act jointly. OFSI explains the UK test in its general guidance. Our guide to sanctions compliance for small businesses compares the US, UK, EU and Australian rules.
To check ownership:
- Ask the company. Request the names of anyone owning 25% or more, and its parent company. Keep the answer.
- Check public registers where they exist. In the UK, Companies House lists people with significant control for free. Many countries have no free equivalent, so the company's own answer is often what you have.
- Screen each owner and parent against the same lists, using step 3 for their names too.
If the owners are unclear and the deal is large or the country is high risk, treat that as a reason to dig further before you go ahead.
Step 5: read the result properly
A hit is a possible match, not a finding. OFAC's FAQ 5 sets out how to check one. Start by confirming which list the hit is on. Then compare the details in the list entry with what you know about the company:
- country and address
- registration or tax numbers
- date of incorporation
- aliases and linked names
- the sanctions program and any notes in the entry
A common name in the right country with the wrong address and a different registration number is likely a false positive. Write down why you cleared it. A matching address, registration number or owner is not something to clear yourself. Stop and escalate.
For the US steps on a real match, see what is the OFAC SDN list? The UK steps are in our UK Sanctions List guide.
Step 6: keep a dated record
A check you cannot show later is worth little to a bank, an auditor or a regulator. For each company, record:
- the date and time of the check
- every name you searched, including owners
- the lists you searched and the version or update date each tool showed
- the result, and the reason for clearing any hit
- who did the check
Keep it with the company's record in your accounting system or files. OFAC requires records of transactions subject to its rules to be kept for at least 10 years.
Doing this for every contact
These steps work for one company you are about to sign with. For every vendor and customer in your books, checked again each time the lists change, the manual route stops being practical. Our guides show the manual process inside QuickBooks Online and Xero.
Sanctions Verified, opening to QuickBooks Online and Xero users, runs the search across eight official lists for every contact, rechecks them when the lists change, and attaches a dated certificate to each record. To try it on one company now, use the free check.
