Patriot Act arrives for fund companies.

(From Funds International)

Nearly two years after passage of the USA Patriot Act, another piece of the law kicked in this month, requiring mutual funds to bring their customer identification programs into compliance with rules issued by the Treasury Department and the Securities and Exchange Commission. Charles Davis reports The USA Patriot Act, which amended the Bank Secrecy Act in establishing minimum standards for identifying customers who open accounts at financial institutions, became effective in June, but banks and financial institutions had until 1 October to comply.

In the mutual fund business, every fund provider's so-called customer identification program (CIP) must define its methods for profiling new individual and corporate customers who are opening accounts, as well as define its methods for maintaining data on them.

Fund companies must obtain and verify the following pieces of …