Bank ordered to disclose suspicious activity reports to customer

Lonsdale v National Westminster Bank [2018] EWHC 1843 (QB) (18 July 2018) 

A bank was ordered to disclose, to a customer, suspicious activity reports (SARs) that the bank had sent to the National Crime Agency (NCA) at the time of freezing the customer’s bank accounts. The bank’s arguments concerning confidentiality, tipping-off and prejudicing an investigation were unsuccessful. The court’s observations on the interplay between the SARs regime and the law on data protection, defamation and breach of contract will be of interest to all banks.