Case study
A community bank cuts enhanced due diligence time from days to hours with CLEAR Investigate
Using Thomson Reuters CLEAR Investigate, a Texas community bank cut enhanced due diligence (EDD) turnaround from one to two days to half a day, while strengthening case quality and confidence
Executive summary
A Texas community bank modernized its BSA and AML investigative workflow by incorporating Thomson Reuters CLEAR Investigate to accelerate enhanced due diligence (EDD) on higher-risk customers and entities. With their previous solutions, analysts struggled with learning niche features, and reviewing large reports to find information was time-intensive. By joining the beta program, the bank got early access to CLEAR Investigate. Analysts now use structured prompts to retrieve clean, consolidated answers. The result is a markedly faster EDD cycle — shrinking from one to two days to roughly half a day per case — plus greater confidence in results, backed by stronger evidence.
Half a day
EDD completion time reduced from one to two days to roughly half a day per case
Improved entity resolution
About 80% of searches return a single relevant match on the first pass
2 years
Solved a case that multiple institutions could not crack for two years
The opportunity: Existing tools were robust but required time-intensive analysis
As a community bank, the BSA and AML investigations team manages recurring EDD reviews across customers such as money services businesses (MSBs), ATM owners, politically exposed persons, cash-intensive businesses, and accounts with multiple Suspicious Activity Report (SAR) filings. Analysts would start by searching external data to corroborate identities, addresses, assets, and potential red flags.
Several pain points surfaced in the prior workflow. First, an analyst noted confusion with the associated individuals that were returned in a person search. He found it difficult to clarify the nature of those relationships, forcing additional manual research. Second, MSB identification appeared inconsistent — some verified MSBs surfaced while others did not — undermining confidence in relying on a single source. Third, the legacy process frequently slowed case closure. One analyst recalled receiving eight pages of entity results despite entering precise identifiers, which made it difficult to quickly isolate the right record.
The impact was cumulative; more toggling across systems to run additional searches, and more time spent interpreting information. For a team measured on timely, defensible decisions, these frictions translated into EDD cycles that often stretched over one to two days per case — slowing throughput and increasing backlog risk.
“When I first started this job and doing EDDs, it would take a day or two to complete one case. Using CLEAR Investigate, it now takes me half a day.”
Senior BSA Analyst, Texas Community Bank
The solution: An agentic AI investigative chatbot
With access to CLEAR Investigate, the analyst shifted the primary workflow to a prompt-driven experience — entering a question, then allowing Investigate to assemble a concise profile while continuing other tasks in parallel. A Senior BSA Analyst at the bank said, “I continue working my case on my second monitor while CLEAR Investigate is thinking”. Once it is done thinking, CLEAR Investigate provides a response to the prompt in a simple, readable layout.
Through access to the open web, CLEAR Investigate is also able to return information that existing public records aggregators do not have access to. The Senior BSA Analyst noted that the business information CLEAR Investigate provides is well beyond what he could find with his previous process. “It provides me so much more information like who are the key principles, the city and the state, the status of the business, whether it was active or dormant.” It also offers optional next-step suggestions — such as open web or criminal structure checks — that the analyst could choose to run and append to the same report. Once the profile returns, details are validated against internal systems by the analyst, and the output is exported to PDF and attached to the case record.
The outcome: Faster reviews, stronger cases, clearer decisions
CLEAR Investigate materially shortened EDD cycle time. The ability to get a direct response to a question eliminated the time needed to review long reports. Since searching in CLEAR Investigate also returns open-source information, it eliminates the need for extra web searches. “When I first started this job and doing EDDs, it would take approximately maybe a day to two days to complete one EDD. I can honestly tell you it’ll take me half a day to complete one using CLEAR Investigate.”
Beyond speed, the analyst emphasized that CLEAR Investigate has made their cases stronger. This strength is due to the accuracy of the data that is returned, along with additional data sources that CLEAR Investigate can access. “Ultimately, after everything is said and done, it makes my case a lot stronger. So, information that I had maybe six months ago…It was great, but this is even better.”
As a real-world example of how CLEAR Investigate has helped, the Senior BSA Analyst shared the team questioned heavy cash activity from a personal account. CLEAR Investigate revealed the customer owned a local, cash intensive business, aligning transactions to the business model and enabling branch outreach to open the proper business account — resolving concerns without escalation.
In another example, multiple institutions were unsure about a subject’s cash movements and relationship to a frequent counterparty. “Me personally, I’ve been looking at him for about two years now, and we’ve had collaborations with other institutions where we just don’t know what in the world’s going on with this guy. So again, grab his information, plug it in to (CLEAR) Investigate. Voila. This guy owns two different businesses; his wife is on them. It answered so many questions”, said the analyst.
By reducing enhanced due diligence review time and strengthening case quality through richer data, the bank can achieve significant operational and strategic benefits. Faster reviews mean lower compliance costs and improved resource efficiency, allowing teams to handle higher volumes. Stronger cases reduce regulatory risk and increase confidence in decision-making, which helps protect the institution’s reputation and avoid costly penalties. Ultimately, these improvements enable the bank to scale its compliance program more effectively, support growth initiatives, and deliver a better customer experience — all while maintaining robust risk management.
At a glance
Accelerate enhanced due diligence with CLEAR Investigate
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