A truly sustainable company must have ethical business practices. At RBC, one of our key values is to operate with trust through integrity in everything we do. Our blueprint for ethical behaviour includes a strong foundation of principles, codes and formal policies designed to protect consumers, combat corruption, ensure business continuity, and facilitate reporting of breaches or concerns.

Policies
RBC has enterprise-wide compliance policies and processes to support the assessment and management of risks, including policies to address issues such as economic sanctions, lending to political parties, money laundering, terrorism financing, conflicts of interest and gifts and entertainment. Policies and controls are reviewed regularly to ensure continued effectiveness and alignment with relevant laws and regulations.

Anti-money laundering
RBC is strongly committed to preventing the use of our financial services for money laundering or terrorist financing purposes. Annually, every RBC employee worldwide, regardless of his or her role in the organization, takes an anti-money laundering/anti-terrorism financing course and exam. The course is tailored for each business, function and geography with material specific to the laws of 48 countries and jurisdictions in which we operate. Our Global Anti-Money Laundering Compliance Group develops and maintains policies, guidelines, training and risk assessment tools and models and other controls to help our employees protect RBC and our clients and to ensure we are managing ever-evolving money laundering and terrorism financing risks. Our controls in this area incorporate Know Your Client rules established by various regulators to ensure we properly identify our clients and protect against the illegal use of our products and services.

Code of Conduct
All RBC employees worldwide are governed by our Code of Conduct, which was first established more than 20 years ago. The code is reviewed regularly and was updated in 2008 to clarify provisions regarding use of company-provided Internet access, sharing of information with third parties and contacts for reporting irregularities. All employees are required to take a web-based learning program and test or follow an alternative process approved by our Human Resources Group, so that they know and understand the code’s principles and compliance elements. Employees must review the code and acknowledge adherence to it when they join RBC and at least once every two years thereafter. The company’s most senior officers and select others must complete the program annually.

Crisis management
RBC uses a best-in-class Business Continuity Management program to ensure that our businesses are adequately prepared to deal with any disruption of service to clients. Risk assessments of all areas are conducted annually and further supported with contingency plans and periodic testing.

The RBC Enterprise Crisis Management team, consisting of senior executives from across the organization, is responsible for ensuring continued service to our clients. It is supported by a global network of regional, business-line and local incident management teams. These teams are on call around the clock to address any situation that may pose material risk to staff, corporate reputation or our ability to deliver service to clients. Regular crisis simulations are conducted to test the readiness for, and timeliness of responses to emergency situations.

The RBC Business Emergency Information Line is our link to employees, providing current updates in the event of a crisis or external situation affecting their ability to access RBC offices or serve our clients.

Reporting suspected irregularities
RBC employees around the world have the duty to report suspected breaches of our Code of Conduct, other irregularities and dishonesty. We have long-established processes that enable employees to do so, and our Code of Conduct protects employees from retaliation for any report made in good faith.

Specific to financial reporting practices, the RBC Reporting Hotline was established so employees and third parties around the world can report suspected irregularities or wrongdoing relating to accounting, auditing or internal accounting controls directly to the RBC Ombudsman, anonymously, confidentially and without fear of retaliation.

For more information, visit rbc.com/responsibility/governance