11 International ACH transactions and OFAC scanning

This chapter covers the final sprint of our program iteration. Of course, the business unit will get together for another PI planning session, and the process will start all over again. In this sprint, we are tasked with enhancing the project to expand beyond domestic ACH transactions and deal with batches containing international ACH transactions (IAT), which enable sending money electronically between accounts in different countries. Along with IAT processing, there is the need to ensure the financial institution is not sending transactions to individuals or countries that are currently under restrictions or sanctioned by the US government. Specifically, the Office of Foreign Asset Control (OFAC) provides a list of “Specially Designated Nationals,” also known as the SDN list, which is a register of individuals and companies whose assets are blocked, and dealing with them is prohibited.

11.1 Sprint planning

11.2 International ACH transactions

11.2.1 IAT batches: An overview

11.3 Creating IAT batches

11.3.1 Database changes

11.4 IAT record parsing

11.5 IAT file processing

11.5.1 Unit testing

11.5.2 Updating file processing

11.6 Effects on the dashboard

11.6.1 The get_batches method

11.6.2 Batch entries

11.7 OFAC scanning

11.7.1 Sanctioned individuals and countries

11.7.2 Scanning for individuals

11.8 Application programming interface

Summary