Rodney Hartles responds to judgment

On August 8^th 2012, the decision of Justice Woolford was released where the appeal by Mr Gilmour was upheld and I was held to be personally liable for his losses.

Mr Gilmour first invested with Forsyth Barr in 1998. He retired in 2000 however he was unsure exactly when he retired.  He withdrew his funds in 2000 and approached AMP (Alan Hartles, my brother) about investing with AMP. Mr Gilmour did not want what Alan had to offer as he wanted quarterly interest so Alan gave him a Strategic Finance Investment Statement with my stamp on it and referred Mr Gilmour to me.  Mr Gilmour then placed his initial investment with Strategic Finance without any contact with me.

I spoke to Mr Gilmour by phone in June 2000, October 2001 and May 2002.  We did not meet initially but did have two brief subsequent meetings when Mr Gilmour collected application forms from me. I regarded the relationship as transactional only, without advice.  I did not keep formal file notes and I did not get Mr Gilmour to sign an Extent of Service document.  Mr Gilmour was firm about what he wanted to invest in and he asked me to supply Finance Company application forms to allow him to proceed.

The problematic transaction was the rollover of a Bridgecorp debenture which had previously been recommended in 2001 for a period of two years.  Early in 2003 Mr Gilmour's wife died and he was of a mind to lock up his funds for the longest possible time and to forget about them.  I tried to dissuade him from this course of action but he went ahead, unbeknownst to me at the time.