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The draft Law on the Central Register of Accounts

The draft Law on the Central Register of Accounts

The Czech Ministry of Finance launched on 17 June 2015 an intra-governmental consultation on the draft Law on Central Register of Accounts. The consultation was completed on 16 July 2015. This means that the draft law is at an early stage of the legislative process. The process may be monitored on: https://apps.odok.cz/kpl-detail?pid=KORN9XKDLJ34

According to the submission report on the draft law and other related documents, the main objective of the draft law is to improve public sector efficiency by enabling certain authorities subject to the banking secrecy and confidentiality according to the Act on Credit Unions (e.g. tax authorities, authorities conducting criminal proceedings, intelligence service) by single question and in a very short time to receive information on where (i.e. with which credit institution) a person had or has an account. The information leak in sensitive cases should be minimized. It is assumed that the cost of the establishment and running costs of the central register system will be at least compensated by the savings of material and personal costs that would be otherwise spent when querying all credit institutions.

Moreover, it is stated that the register shall contain the information on accounts with the credit institutions of both natural and legal persons. It shall not contain the balances of accounts. The collected data will be archived for 5 years. The central register of accounts should be operated by the Czech National Bank and the costs of its operation should be compensated by the government. The CNB also represents for all stakeholders a sufficient guarantee of the collected data protection.