From Wednesday 28 January 2026, the UK government is simplifying how sanctions designations are published and maintained. Instead of having two separate lists, there will be one official source of sanctions information: the UK Sanctions List (UKSL).
What’s changing?
Today, UK sanctions data appears in two places:
- The UK Sanctions List (UKSL) – published by the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office and covering all types of sanctions (financial, trade, transport, immigration, etc.).
- The OFSI Consolidated List of Asset Freeze Targets – maintained by HM Treasury’s Office of Financial Sanctions Implementation and focused only on financial sanctions.
From 28 January 2026, the UKSL becomes the only active sanctions list. The OFSI Consolidated List (and its search tool) will stop being updated and will no longer be used for compliance purposes.
What this means for you
Nothing changes for Credas clients.
We already monitor and integrate updates from the UK Sanctions List, so you don’t need to take any action to stay compliant with this change.
If your organisation uses other tools or systems that currently rely on the OFSI Consolidated List, you’ll want to make sure they’re switched to the UK Sanctions List by 28 January 2026, ideally the earlier the better.
In particular, systems that use the older “OFSI Group ID” identifier should be updated to use the UKSL’s “Unique ID” for new designations. Historic OFSI Group IDs will remain in the UKSL for legacy purposes.
Why the change?
The government has listened to industry feedback that maintaining two lists was duplicative and could create unnecessary work or confusion. Moving to a single, authoritative list aims to simplify screening processes, reduce risk of discrepancies across sources and make compliance more efficient.
If you’re a Credas client, you would not have encountered this confusion. Our software has always searched across both of the UK Sanction lists, plus dozens of others, presenting you with a single, consolidated result for a more seamless experience.
What’s staying the same?
- The structure and fields of the UK Sanctions List won’t change.
- The list will continue to be published in its current formats (Excel, Word, XML, HTML), with additional formats like CSV, PDF, and plain text added.
- A UKSL search tool remains available and will be enhanced with improved search features later in January.
It’s also important to note that this change is only for the UK Sanctions Lists. Our Sanctions screening solutions continues to be conducted against UN Security Council list, EU Sanctions List, US Department of State, US Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), and Global Sanctions and Financial Bodies.
If you have any queries or questions regarding this, reach out to your Account Manager or our support team.
