4–8 hoursper SAR filedOne report ties up a senior analyst for most of a day, at $350–700 fully loaded. SAR work consumes 30–40% of a mid-market compliance team’s total hours.Observed range across mid-market programs. BPI’s 2024 survey of 15 large banks reports 21.4 hours per SAR, against FinCEN’s 1.98-hour Paperwork Reduction Act estimate.
92–97%AML false-positive rateAnalysts spend their days clearing noise. Tuning alone won’t fix it — the fragmented data underneath the detection logic is what keeps regenerating the alerts.Bank Policy Institute, Getting to Effectiveness (2018): 19 institutions reviewed ~16 million alerts and filed ~640,000 SARs.
$1,500–$3,500per KYB reviewEvery corporate customer is a file that has to be rebuilt on a refresh cycle. Ongoing review — not onboarding — is where regulators find the failures.Fenergo’s 2023 survey of 1,100+ banking executives puts the average commercial KYC review at $2,598.
30 daysfrom determination to filingNo extensions. When alert volume outruns team capacity, the backlog isn’t an efficiency problem. It’s a finding in an exam report.31 CFR 1020.320(b)(3). Thirty further days only where no suspect is identified — never beyond 60.