Pro Bono partnerships are delivering regulatory reform for and with stateless and forcibly displaced people.
Stateless and forcibly displaced people across the EU and UK have long faced barriers to opening a bank account and accessing financial institutions. This is not just because the law frequently excludes them, but also because these institutions are often unfamiliar with the legal identification stateless and displaced people hold, or lack expertise on the protection statuses many of them rely on. Upcoming changes to EU banking regulation are set to improve access to basic banking services for people without conventional identity documents, directly addressing a longstanding gap. A multi-year pro bono partnership brokered by PILnet played a crucial role in advancing this change.
The initiative began roughly three years ago, when PILnet’s clearinghouse connected Apatride Network, a stateless-led organization, with a group of international law firms to research financial exclusion in the EU and UK. In 2024, PILnet connected Apatride Network with several pro bono law firms, one of which went on to lead the long-term regulatory research.
The firms analysed the regulatory framework governing customer due diligence, while Apatride Network conducted 50 semi-structured interviews (carried out between November 2023 and May 2025) with documented stateless people, refugees, and asylum claimants across 19 EU countries and the UK, recording their experiences trying to access banking services. The findings showed that existing law and guidance, including the EU’s Payment Accounts Directive and the UK’s Joint Money Laundering Steering Group (JMLSG) Guidance, already provided a basis for inclusion, but that gaps in awareness and training among financial institution staff remained a persistent barrier.
A collaboration that grew out of the PILnet Global Forum
The connection that lead to this partnership traces back to PILnet’s 2023 Global Forum in Brussels, where PILnet supported Apatride Network’s participation following engagement with the UNHCR Refugee Advisory Group. It was at the Forum where Apatride Network first met the European Center for Not-for-Profit Law (ECNL). Around February 2025, ECNL invited Apatride Network to join forces with a coalition of expert organizations and European networks taking part in direct consultations with the European Banking Authority (EBA) on a new Regulatory Technical Standard (RTS) on customer due diligence in the context of the new EU anti-money laundering and countering terrorism financing regulatory package. Although the coalition’s primary focus was the rights of not-for-profit organizations, Apatride Network used the opportunity, drawing on its PILnet-supported research, to raise the specific challenges faced by stateless and forcibly displaced individuals, submitting written input in early June 2025.
“The change to the regulatory technical standards of the European Banking Authority is a vital lifeline for vulnerable populations in Europe. It means the alleviation of arbitrary treatment by making clear, for example, that statelessness exists and that a lack of a conventional national passport should not automatically result in exclusion from essential financial services,” said Aleksejs Ivashuk, founder of Apatride network. “Ultimately, compliance to these new standards means that people’s lives will be more liveable and aligned to the fundamental values of a free society. This is especially so because financial inclusion is closely tied to other essentials such as employment, housing, and the ability to participate in the economy and society. The change benefits everyone. “
In its response, published in October 2025, the EBA revised its draft Regulatory Technical Standard to address several of the concerns Apatride Network raised, a real step forward for the people it represents. The revised standard specifies that where a person cannot provide a standard identity document, passport, or equivalent document for a legitimate reason, including statelessness, refugee or subsidiary protection status, an unresolved residence status that cannot legally be enforced by removal, or homelessness, obliged entities must accept other credible means of establishing identity, including a signed declaration. This change could make it significantly easier for people who lack conventional identity documents to access basic banking services, reducing a longstanding barrier to financial inclusion and enabling greater participation in everyday economic life. The revised standard also confirms that nationality can be established through a declaration rather than documentation, since not all identity documents record this information.
What practical implementation will look like
Once the revised RTS is implemented, all financial institutions operating in the EU will be expected to comply with them, though genuine compliance is far from guaranteed given how many banks already fall short under the existing Payment Accounts Directive. What sets this approach apart is its specificity: rather than a broad mandate, it spells out concrete requirements, from recognising statelessness as a valid legal category to confirming that a passport is just one of several acceptable forms of identity.
While the EBA’s response did not address all of Apatride Network’s concerns, the organization is updating its report to reflect the changes and will continue to monitor how the revised standards are implemented in practice. The standards are not yet final: meanwhile, the new EU anti-money laundering authority, AMLA, has taken over the mandate from the EBA. AMLA still needs to submit the RTS to the European Commission for adoption, a step Apatride Network describes as the remaining formality after the hardest stage of the process. The standards are expected to come into effect in July 2027.
“The partnership that made the change possible was instrumental in turning evidence of real-world barriers into concrete, well-grounded recommendations capable of influencing regulation at the European level,” said Ivashuk.
It is too early to assess the full scale of the impact, though Apatride hopes it will go a long way in ensuring access to financial institutions for stateless, forcibly displaced, and other marginalised people in the EU and the UK. Refugees and asylum seekers are the easiest group to count: UNHCR puts their number in the EU today at almost 10 million. Stateless people are often under-represented in official data, precisely because their status may go unrecognised. The revised standards reach further still, extending protection to homeless people and anyone lacking legal identification. Taken together, the number of people who could ultimately benefit likely runs into the millions.
Because the EBA standard is an EU instrument, it does not automatically apply in the UK. Following Brexit, a comparable change there would require separate domestic regulatory or legislative action. Apatride Network’s research indicated that the UK already performs better than the EU on financial inclusion for vulnerable groups, a finding the organization explores further in its broader financial inclusion report.
Stronger regulation on its own will not guarantee better practice on the ground. People affected by financial exclusion may still be reluctant to challenge banks or report discriminatory treatment given their vulnerable circumstances, which is why Apatride Network intends to keep engaging banks directly, particularly those already demonstrating good practice, and to continue raising awareness so that affected individuals understand their new rights and feel better equipped to assert them. Awareness of these rights is essential to ensuring that financial institutions are held accountable for putting the new standards into practice.
Organizations working on financial inclusion, statelessness, or displacement-related legal barriers can access PILnet’s free legal support by submitting a request through our legal support form.