Disclosure

Castle Trust Financial Planning Ltd (FSP59941) is a Financial Advice Provider.

We give advice in a range of different financial areas - complete financial plans or specific areas such as personal insurance, savings, investments, pension transfers or mortgages. We work as a team but all have areas where we specialise. As a result you may have different staff advising you at different points in the planning process.

We are able to use the products of almost any provider operating in the NZ market. These are the ones we currently choose to use.

The initial discussion is without advice, charge or commitment.

For providing a client with insurance advice and the work involved in setting up a new policy, Castle Trust is paid initial commission from the insurance company used. Servicing commission is also paid over the years for providing ongoing advice. So there is normally no need for Castle Trust to charge clients when a new policy is taken out.

We offer a review and second opinion service for clients with existing insurance not set up by Castle Trust who want to ensure their insurance is still the best fit for their needs. Our fee for this service is $150+GST per hour, capped at $250+GST. If we find that the situation is more complex, we’ll discuss with you and agree how to proceed.

A list of commission rates can be seen at the end of this document.

We have an initial three-meeting process for investment clients. Each meeting costs $100+GST and lasts about an hour. You can stop at any time. 

There is no initial set up fee for regular savings or KiwiSaver where we are also providing insurance advice. If we are planning stand alone savings advice, we charge in the same way as investment clients - three meetings of $100+GST per meeting. 

There is no charge to arrange the transfer of your UK pension to New Zealand. 

This table outlines the ongoing charges for investment advice paid to Castle Trust by the product providers by deduction from the funds invested.

For providing clients with mortgage advice and the work involved in arranging or re-arranging a mortgage Castle Trust is paid commission or fee by the lender. In some cases a small renewal commission may also be paid. So there is normally no need for Castle Trust to charge clients for their mortgage advice. The amount of the commission is based on the amount of the mortgage and the rate of each lender – these can be seen at the end of this document. Where we arrange a mortgage with a non-bank lender there may be a fee charged to the client, however, this will be discussed and agreed beforehand. If a lending application is complex, we may charge an hourly rate for our time. This will be discussed and agreed before charges are incurred.

If a mortgage is cancelled or refinanced within two years of settlement, we must repay some or all of the commission we have received. This is known as a clawback. This means we have essentially done the work for no pay. We therefore reserve the right to charge a fee for our time if a clawback is incurred. The fee will be the estimated amount of hours the mortgage took at an hourly rate of $250 per hour, capped at $2,500. We will invoice you for this fee and it will be payable on the 20th of the month following the clawback.

If you are refinancing or selling your house, the best thing to do is immediately talk to your adviser and discuss if any clawback fees will be charged.

There are sometimes occasions where we need to charge for our time. This will be agreed before hand. Our hourly rate is currently $250 +GST.

Fees are subject to change, however, this will be discussed and agreed in advance.

We are here for our clients and to advise you as best we can. Your interests are our priority although we do have business relationships with product providers also. We also receive remuneration from some product providers such as commissions.

We manage these conflicts of interest by ensuring that we prioritise your interests above our own. The advice we provide is based on understanding your goals and circumstances and providing recommendations which are based on research.

To ensure that our financial advisers prioritise our clients’ interests above their own, we follow an advice process that ensures our recommendations are made on the basis of each client’s goals and circumstances. All our staff are paid on an hourly or salary structure. They are not paid commission.

If you have a problem, concern or complaint about any part of our advice or service, please tell us so that we can try to fix the problem. Please contact the team member concerned or our internal complaints manager Kathryn Alborough who can be reached via email at kathryn@castletrust.co.nz or 03 528 4184.

If we cannot agree on how to fix the issue you can contact Financial Services Complaints Limited (FSCL) – A Financial Ombudsman Service. This service will cost you nothing and will help us to resolve any disagreements. You can contact FSCL by emailing info@fscl.org.nz or by calling 0800 347257. You can also write to them at PO Box 5967, Lambton Quay, Wellington 6145.

All advisers are bound by the duties of the Financial Markets Conduct Act to:

You can contact us at:
Castle Trust Financial Planning
Phone: 03 544 1428
Email: admin@castletrust.co.nz
Address: 278 Queen Street, Next to the Library

Calculated as a percentage of annual premium.

Stylecover (house, contents and vehicle insurance) pay 60% of the brokerage commission. This equates to about 15% of the annual premium. For general insurance referred to Aon, we receive 20% of the brokerage on new business and 10% on renewal. For general insurance referred to Tower, we receive commission of 10% for a new policy, and 5% on renewal each year. 

Calculated as a percentage of loan value.