South Korea: corporate life-insurance onboarding

KoFIU treats entering an insurance contract as an account-opening event for customer due diligence. Obtain the company policyholder's registration information, business details and representative's particulars. Use the corporate registration certificate for registered facts and the company's shareholder records for ownership.

Owners and the person buying the policy

Apply the Korean beneficial-owner sequence: individuals holding at least 25%, then the prescribed alternative ownership or control tests, and finally the representative fallback where the earlier steps identify nobody. Trace corporate shareholders through the relevant intermediate companies.

Verify the person applying for the policy and their authority. Obtain a company resolution or delegation covering the purchase and record who may change policy rights or request a surrender.

Review the policy parties and payments

The proposal should identify the insured person, beneficiary and premium payer. Request the company's explanation of employee or director cover and any agreement assigning benefits to a lender. Obtain supporting payment evidence if an unrelated party will fund the premiums.

Higher-risk cases require enhanced information on purpose and source of funds under KoFIU's CDD framework. Refer unexplained third-party payments, rapid surrender requests and changes to payout recipients for review before processing the instruction.

Preserve the proposal, ownership evidence, authority documents and subsequent amendments. Refresh the affected checks when the policyholder's ownership or representatives change; apply recipient checks required by the insurer's insurance procedures when benefits become payable.