Terms and Conditions

Ashburton Investments maintains and owns this site (the “site”) and the services and products (the “services and products”) applicable hereto.

All references in these Terms & Conditions to "us", "we", "our" or "Ashburton Investments" deemed to include, unless stated otherwise, Ashburton Fund Managers (Pty) Ltd, Ashburton Management Company (RF) (Pty) Ltd and FNB CIS Manco (RF) (Pty) Ltd and all subsidiary companies of Ashburton Investments.

In our dealings with you, we are bound by Codes, such as the General Code of Conduct for Authorised Financial Services Providers and their Representatives, 2003 (as amended) and the Association of Savings and Investments South Africa ("ASISA") which can be accessed by you here and/or here.

1. Acceptance

These Terms & Conditions become effective when you access this site for the first time and constitute a valid and binding agreement between Ashburton Investments and yourself, which will always prevail. The current version of these Terms & Conditions governs our respective rights and obligations each time you access this site.

A certificate signed by the administrator responsible for maintaining this site will be prima facie proof of the date of publication and content of the current version and all previous versions of the Terms & Conditions.

If you do not agree to these Terms & Conditions, please do not make use of this site.

2. Nature of Information on the site

All information on this site is only intended to provide you with general information about us and our services and products.

All information is provided "as is" and should not be treated as professional or investment advice of any kind. You should consult your own professional advisors before relying on any information on this site. This site may contain views or opinions that are not necessarily those of Ashburton Investments.

Calculations which may be displayed on this site are intended for the convenience of clients, maybe approximations, and are intended only as guidelines. Should you wish to rely on any calculation you are advised to check the calculations before using them as Ashburton Investments will not be liable for any inaccuracy in the calculation.

Unless indicated in writing by Ashburton Investments, nothing contained herein constitutes an offer or agreement to enter into any services and products, nor does it constitute guidance, a proposal or recommendation to enter into any services and products.

3. Information Feeds

We may use the services of other organisations to provide information on this site. We have no control over this information and make no representations or warranties of any nature as to its accuracy, appropriateness or correctness. You agree that such information is provided "as is" and we will not be directly or indirectly liable for any damages that may arise from your reliance on it.

4. Services

All services and products offered by Ashburton Investments are subject to the signature of the requisite application forms, mandates and other documentation relating thereto and are governed by the terms and conditions and applicable legislation in respect thereof, and Ashburton Investments shall not be bound in any manner until such requisite documentation has been signed by you and accepted by Ashburton Investments.

Ashburton Investments reserves the right to reject any application for services and products contained on this site.
You acknowledge that Ashburton Investments may undertake a credit risk inquiry and hereby grant your consent thereto.
You further acknowledge that, in the event of conflict between the conditions applicable to particular services or products offered on this site and the provisions of these Terms & Conditions, the provisions of the services or products terms and conditions will take precedence.

5. Amendments to these Terms and Conditions

You acknowledge that we may amend these Terms & Conditions from time to time, at our sole discretion. If we elect to amend these Terms & Conditions, the revised version will be posted on this site. You undertake to check this site regularly for any changes we may have made since your last visit to this site, since any such changes will be binding on you. By using this site after we have changed or amended these Terms & Conditions, you acknowledge that you will be accepting those changes or amendments.

These Terms & Conditions were last updated on 19 January 2022.

6. Linked Sites

This site may contain links to other websites. While we try to provide links only to reputable websites, we cannot accept responsibility or liability for the information provided on other websites. Where you access a third party website, you do so at your own risk.

Links to third party websites are provided only for your convenience and you remain solely responsible for complying with the terms and conditions applicable to such third party websites.

7. Electronic Transactions, Instructions, Communications and Records

If you subscribe to a service or product provided on this site, you must ensure that your information is true, accurate and complete as prompted by the registration process for using the service or transaction in the product.

Ashburton Investments shall be entitled to regard all instructions and transactions received from you as actually originating from you and to act on such instructions.

In relation to the conclusion of electronic transactions, Ashburton Investments will at all times and where applicable comply with our obligations in terms of the Electronic Communications and Transactions Act 25 of 2002 (as amended).

When you communicate with Ashburton Investments by electronic communication provided or as may be directed on this site, you consent to receiving responses to your communications by electronic communication addressed to you by Ashburton Investments. You thereby agree that all electronic agreements, notices, disclosures and other communications sent by Ashburton Investments satisfy any legal requirement that such communications should be in writing.

You accept the risks inherent in electronic communication in whatever form and consent to Ashburton Investments acting on the information communicated by you to us electronically. It is your responsibility to ensure that Ashburton Investments has received the information communicated by you electronically.

You acknowledge and consent that Ashburton Investments, in its discretion, may retain and store your electronic communications as may be lawfully required. You agree that the electronic records stored by Ashburton Investments will constitute rebuttable proof (it may be challenged) of the content of the records. Any email communication sent to you will be regarded for the purposes of this agreement to have been received by you when it enters an information system outside of the control of Ashburton Investments.

8. User ID and Password

If you subscribe to a service or product provided on the Ashburton Investments site you may be required to choose a User ID (an identifying name) and a password, as Ashburton Investments may determine from time to time.

Each time you access this site to logon for purposes of transacting, you will be prompted to enter your User ID and password.

You are entirely responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of your password, monitoring and being aware of all the activities happening on your investment account. You must notify Ashburton Investments immediately should you suspect or be aware of any unauthorised use of your user ID and/or password, either with or without your knowledge.

You are obliged to logoff from this site once you have completed performing a transaction. Failure to log off after transacting which results in an authorised transaction or a fraudulent activity on this site under your online profile shall be for your account.

9. Software

You are required to use and maintain hardware and software of sufficient quality and performance capability. Your failure to do so may result in a higher security risk and/or cause some or all of the functionality of this site not to operate properly or at all.

Software, if any, made available for download on or via our site is governed by license conditions that establish a legal relationship with the licensor. You indemnify us against any and all damage or loss arising from any breach by you of these license conditions. We give no warranty and make no representation, whether express or implied, as to the quality or fitness for purpose of the use of such software.

No warranty, whether express or implied, is given that any files, downloads or applications available via this site are free of viruses, bombs, time-locks or any other data or code which has the ability to corrupt or affect the operation of your computer, database, network or other information system.

10. Permission for Hyperlinks, Deep Linking, Crawlers and Metatags

Nobody may establish a hyperlink, frame, metatag or similar reference, whether electronically or otherwise (collectively referred to as linking), to this site or any subsidiary pages before receiving our prior written approval, which may be withheld or granted subject to the Terms & Conditions we specify from time to time.

An application for linking must be submitted to marketing@ashburton.co.za. Once received we will do our best to respond and enter into further discussions with you. If you don't get a written response from us within five business days, consider your request as having been rejected.

Breach of these Terms & Conditions entitles us to take legal action without prior notice to you and you agree to reimburse the costs associated with such legal action to us on an attorney and own client scale.

11. Our Intellectual Property

This site may contain information proprietary to Ashburton Investments (including its subsidiaries), and may not be reproduced or disseminated in whole or in part without Ashburton Investments' written consent. We retain all copyright and other intellectual property rights in all material, including logos and other graphics and multimedia works published on or via this site.

Nothing on this site should be construed as granting any licence or right to use any trademark without our prior written permission and/or that of third parties, as the case may be. You may not, without our prior written permission, use our intellectual property or that of third parties for any other purposes.

An application to use our intellectual property must be submitted to marketing@ashburton.co.za. Upon receiving your application we will do our best to respond and enter into further discussions with you. If you don't get a written response from us within five business days, consider your request as having been rejected.

Irrespective of the existence of copyright, you acknowledge that we are the proprietor of all material on this site, whether it constitutes confidential information or not, and that you have no right, title or interest in any such material.

12. Transmission of Information

Given the inherent risk with transferring information via the Internet, we do not have the ability to prevent unlawful activities by unscrupulous persons, you accept that we cannot be held liable for any loss, harm or damage suffered by you as a result of such activities.

13. Termination, Suspension and Limitation

We may modify, suspend or discontinue this site, whether temporarily or permanently, without notice. We may also impose limits or Terms & Conditions on the right to certain services, features or functions and we may restrict access to parts of or all of the services on this site.If you commit any material breach of these Terms & Conditions or use the services or in any other manner interacts with this site in an unlawful or unauthorised manner, Ashburton Investments shall be entitled to terminate your access to this site immediately without prior notice and without prejudice to Ashburton Investments other rights in terms of these Terms & Conditions or at law.

14. No Warranties or Representations

We do not warrant that this site will be error free or will meet any particular criteria of accuracy, completeness or reliability of information, performance or quality.

15. Disclaimer and Limitation of Liability

Use of this site is entirely at your own risk. You assume full responsibility for the risk or loss resulting from your use of this site and your reliance on the material and information contained on it.

We and our affiliates, shareholders, agents, consultants or employees are not liable for any damages whatsoever relating to your use of this site or the information contained on this site or your inability to use this site. This includes, without limitation, any direct, indirect, special, incidental, consequential or punitive damages, whether arising out of contract, statute, delict or otherwise and regardless of whether we were expressly advised of the possibility of such loss or damage.

Ashburton Investments does not warrant that any information contained herein or obtained from and by any independent providers (the "information") is complete or correct, and you shall not be entitled to place any reliance on the information contained in this site for any purpose.

Ashburton Investments, to the full extent legally permissible, does not guarantee the timeliness, sequence, accuracy, adequacy, or completeness of the information. To the full extent legally permissible, Ashburton Investments gives no express or implied warranties (including, but not limited to warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular use) with respect to the information.

You acknowledge that our ability to make this site and the information available relies on internet and communications systems which may be unavailable due to interruptions or maintenance to such systems which are not within the control of Ashburton Investments. These interruptions may also result from power outages. Ashburton Investments hereby gives you notice of such unavoidable interruptions and delays in providing this site and the service and undertakes to give you timely notice if scheduled maintenance to any of its systems will cause an interruption or delay in the provision of this site and the information. Neither Ashburton Investments nor any site administrator of information shall be liable in any way, and you agree to indemnify and hold harmless Ashburton Investments and the site administrator for:

(1) any inaccuracy, error, or delay in, or omission of:

(a) any information; or

(b) the transmission or delivery of information;

(2) any loss or damage arising from or occasioned by:

(a) any such inaccuracy, error, delay, or omission; or

(b) nonperformance; or

(c) interruption of information due either to any negligent act or omission by Ashburton Investments or providers/transmitters of information or to any "force majeure" (i.e. flood, extraordinary weather conditions, earthquake, or other act of God, fire, war, insurrection, riot, labour dispute, accident, action of government, communications, power failure, or equipment or software malfunction) or any other cause beyond the reasonable control of Ashburton Investments or the information providers/transmitters.

You acknowledge that Ashburton Investments will act on any instruction reasonably purporting to emanate from yourself. Ashburton Investments will not be required to enquire as to the origin of any instruction utilising your User ID or password, and Ashburton Investments shall not be held liable as a result of the unauthorised use of your User ID or password, which you shall keep secret and secure. It is your responsibility to ensure that your personal information is up to date and correct.

16. How disputes will be resolved

All disputes arising as a result of your use of this site or on the interpretation of these Terms & Conditions or on any matter which in terms of the Terms & Conditions requires agreement by the parties, (other than where an interdict is sought or urgent relief may be obtained from a court of competent jurisdiction), will be submitted to and decided by arbitration.

That arbitration will be held with only the parties and their representatives present at the offices of the Arbitration Foundation of Southern Africa, Sandton, Gauteng, South Africa. The arbitration will be governed by the rules of the Arbitration Foundation in terms of South African law and will be heard by an arbitrator or arbitrators appointed by the foundation.

Either party will be entitled to have the award made an order of court of competent jurisdiction. The parties will keep the evidence in the arbitration proceedings and any order made by any arbitrator confidential unless otherwise contemplated. The arbitrator will have the power to give default judgment if any party fails to make submissions on due date and/or fails to appear at the arbitration.

17. The law governing our relationship

The Terms & Conditions will be governed and construed in accordance with the law of the Republic of South Africa without reference to any conflict of law provisions.

18. Capacity to be bound by these Terms and Conditions

You confirm to us that you have the required legal and contractual capacity to enter into and be bound by contractual terms. Minors must be assisted by their legal guardians when reading these Terms & Conditions. If you are unsure whether you have the legal capacity to enter into agreements, you must contact someone able to provide you with this information before you continue using this site.

19. Privacy Notice

The FirstRand Group is a group of entities, some of which operate in other countries. Ashburton is a subsidiary of FirstRand Group. The FirstRand Group follows a multi-branding approach. Some of the group’s major brands in South Africa include FNB, RMB, WesBank, Ashburton Investments, DirectAxis and MotoVantage.

Our Privacy Notice governs the way the FirstRand Group (‘us’; ‘we’ or ‘our’), treat your personal information collected electronically when you use our website, apply online for certain products and services, contact us electronically or register for one of the services offered on the website. We respect your privacy and treat your personal information as confidential. Your personal information may be collected, processed, transferred, and disclosed by Ashburton in the normal course of business to effectively process your transaction instructions. Ashburton will disclose or report personal information if required to do so by law or any regulatory authority, and to our employees, or agents who require such information to carry out their duties in fulfilling your transaction.

Ashburton may retain any information for purposes of investment transactions, processing, and administration and to communicate directly with you. The type of information we collect will depend on the purpose for which it is collected and used. We will only collect information that we need for that purpose. Ashburton may share information with companies within in FirstRand Group and service providers with whom we have a business agreement to process such information on our behalf or to those who render services to us. You may access the personal information we have on record for you, and you may request that we correct any errors or delete your information. Our Privacy Notice explains how we use, collect, share and store your personal information. You may access our full Privacy Notice here: FirstRand Group Customer Privacy Notice.

Personal Information

Your privacy is important to us and Ashburton Investments is committed to ensuring that your personal information is kept confidential.

Use of information

Personal information is used as is appropriate in the normal course of business to provide the products and services you have requested. We may retain any information for purposes of investment transaction and administration to monitor our site or to communicate directly with you, unless expressly directed by you not to do so.

Information security and quality

We intend to protect the quality and integrity of your personal information in all respects, including the use of encryption technology. However, we cannot guarantee the security of any information you transmit to us electronically and you do so at your own risk.

Sharing of information

We will not sell, rent or trade your personal information to any third party and we will take all reasonable steps to ensure that information collected by us is kept strictly confidential. We will only disclose or report personal information when lawfully required to do so and to comply with any relevant legalisation, or regulatory authority or any legal process.

Changes to the Privacy Notice

Our Privacy Notice can be found at www.firstrand.co.za We reserve the right in our sole discretion to amend the Privacy Policy from time to time. You agree to review the Privacy Policy whenever you visit this website for any such amendments. Save as expressly provided to the contrary in the Privacy Policy, the amended version of the Privacy Policy shall supersede and replace all previous versions thereof.

Which laws apply?

This privacy term and the Privacy Policy will be governed by and construed and interpreted in accordance with the laws of the Republic of South Africa. To the extent that a court has jurisdiction over any dispute which may arise out of or in connection with the Privacy Policy, you and owners of this website submit to the jurisdiction of the South African Courts.

Questions regarding this Privacy Policy should be directed to the Ashburton SA Compliance Department on dlashburtonsacompliance@ashburton.co.za.

The Information Regulator (South Africa)
SALU Building
316 Thabo Sehume Street
Pretoria
Tel: 012 406 4818
Fax: 086 500 3351
Email: inforeg@justice.gov.za

20. General Provisions

The headings of the clauses in the Terms & Conditions are provided for convenience and ease of reference only and will not be used to interpret, modify or amplify the Terms & Conditions.

Where any dates or times need to be calculated in terms of the Terms & Conditions, the international standard time: GMT plus two hours shall be used.

No failure or delay by us to exercise any of our rights under law or in terms of these Terms & Conditions will be interpreted as a waiver of any such right, whether this is done expressly or implied, nor will it affect the validity of any part of these Terms & Conditions or prejudice our rights to take subsequent action against you.

If any provision of these Terms & Conditions is held to be invalid, unlawful or unenforceable for whatsoever reason, the relevant provision will be deleted from the Terms & Conditions and all remaining provisions will continue to be valid to the full extent permitted by law.

If you have any questions or do not understand anything in these Terms & Conditions, please send an email to query@ashburton.co.za or call our Client Service Team on +27 (0) 860 000 339 and we will respond to you as soon as possible.

Click here to view our FAIS Conflict of Interest Policy

Click here to view our FAIS Complaints Resolution Policy

Promotion of Access to Information Act

The Promotion of Access to Information Act (PAIA), No 2 of 2002 was enacted to give effect to the constitutional right of access to any information held by any private or public body that is required for the exercise or protection of any rights. Certain requirements, however, have to be met for access to any information being granted. The FirstRand Information Manual can be accessed here.

The Act requires that a manual be prepared to assist people in exercising their right of access to information. Click below to download the PAIA Guide in English, isiZulu or Afrikaans.

21. Cookies

Privacy is important to the group. This cookie notice applies to all websites that belong to the group which are applicable to South Africa.

Please refer to the FirstRand group customer privacy notice for details of the entities that form part of the group, and the way the group uses personal information. The FirstRand group cookie policy is available here.

FirstRand Limited and its subsidiary companies (FirstRand or the group) is a portfolio of integrated financial services businesses operating in South Africa, certain markets in sub-Saharan Africa and in the UK. FirstRand executes its strategy through a portfolio of leading financial services businesses comprising FNB, RMB, WesBank, Direct Axis, Ashburton Investments and Aldermore and provides a universal set of transactional, lending, investment and insurance products and services.

A simplified group structure can be found on FirstRand’s website and provides an overview of the various businesses/entities that form part of the FirstRand group here.

What is a cookie?

A cookie is a small piece of data that is sent (usually in the form of a text file) from a website to the user’s device, such as a computer, smartphone or tablet. The purpose of a cookie is to provide a reliable mechanism to “remember” user behaviour (keeping track of previous actions), e.g. remembering the contents of an online shopping cart, and actions the user performed whilst browsing when not signed up or logged into their online account.

The group does not necessarily know the identity of the user of the device but does see the behaviour recorded on the device. Multiple users of the same device would not necessarily be distinguishable from one another. Cookies could, however, be used to identify the device and, if the device is linked to a specific user, the user would also be identifiable. For example, a device registered to an app (FNB, WesBank, RMB, etc.).

Which cookies can be found on the First Rand Group website?

First- and third-party cookies refer to the website or domain using the cookie. Cookies are set by the website that the user is visiting.

First-party cookies are directly stored by the website (or domain) visited by a user. These cookies allow website owners to collect analytics, data, remember language settings or perform other useful functions that provide a good user experience.

Third-party cookies are created by domains separate/different from the website (or domain) that the user is visiting. These cookies are usually used for online advertising, cross-site tracking; and are accessible on any website that loads the third party’s server code, e.g. when a user visits a site and clicks a “like” button, this could be stored in a cookie and, upon visiting the third-party site, the cookie will be used to action the request.

For example, a user browses online for a specific product, finds an advert of interest, clicks the advert and thereafter closes their browser. Several hours later, the user notices advertising of the same product that they were browsing for earlier.

When a user visits a group website, the group may include any of the cookies listed in the table below. The table explains what the cookies are used for and the time period for which the cookie could remain valid. Where cookies are only valid for a single session, the cookie will be erased when the user closes their browser. Where cookies persist, the cookie will be stored by the user’s browser until deleted by the user.

Origin	Use	Service	Duration
First-party cookies	Browser/device identification	Enable the group to identify the device/browser.	Persist beyond a single session.
	Authentication	Upon logging into a web server, a cookie will be returned that identifies the user has been successfully logged in.	Only valid for the single session.
First- and third-party cookies	Analytics	To collect information about how visitors, use group websites. This can provide the group with insight on website performance and metrics.	Persist beyond a single session.
Third-party cookies	Marketing and other	Used for tracking and online advertising purposes.	Persist beyond a single session.

Option	Description
HTTPS	Makes a cookie secure by ensuring it is only sent over HTTPS protocol. This prevents attackers from secretly extracting it.
Same-site cookie	Makes the cookie secure by limiting the sites to which the cookie is allowed to be sent.
Expiry	Sets the duration a cookie will last for before it expires.
Secure	Makes a cookie secure by ensuring it is only sent over a securely encrypted channel.
Path	Helps to protect a cookie by restricting the location where it is allowed to be sent.

When will the group use cookies?

The group will only process cookies which identify users for lawful purposes:

if a user has consented thereto;
if a person legally authorised by the user, the law or a court, has consented thereto on the user’s behalf;
if it is necessary to conclude or perform under a contract that the group has with the user;
if the law requires or permits it;
if it is required to protect or pursue the user’s, the group’s or a third party’s legitimate interest (e.g. for fraud prevention); or
if the user is a child and a competent person (like a parent) has consented thereto on the child’s behalf.

What happens if the user does not want cookies?

All browsers allow users to refuse to accept cookies and to remove current cookies. The methods for doing so vary between different browsers and versions. Users can block cookies on group websites, if desired. Blocking certain cookies may have a negative impact upon the usability of group websites. For example, the group requires cookies to allow users to log in. By removing first-party cookies, a user’s banking experience may be affected.

Further information about cookies

Users’ browsers store cookies and group websites cannot access any data on a user’s device.
As cookies are stored in text files, they cannot be used to distribute viruses to a device.
On a single device with multiple users; the experience of group websites would be customised based on the behaviour of all users using the device and not just an individual user.
If users disable cookies, previous cookies collected will not be deleted, however, this will prevent the creation of new cookies. Expired cookies will be removed automatically.

Ashburton Investments | A part of the FirstRand Group

Ashburton Fund Managers Proprietary Limited (Reg 2002/013187/07) is an authorised financial services provider (FSP number 40169)