Business Continuity Plan

Richards Merrill Wealth Management has developed a Business Continuity Plan on how we will respond to events that significantly disrupt our business. Since the timing and impact of disasters and disruptions is unpredictable, we will have to be flexible in responding to actual events as they occur. With that in mind, we are providing you with this information on our business continuity plan.

Contacting Us – If after a significant business disruption you cannot contact us as you usually do by phone at either (509) 624-3174 or 1-800-572-5296, go to our website at [new url] . If you cannot access us through either of those means, you should contact our clearing firm, Wells Fargo Clearing Services, LLC (“WFCS”) www.wellsfargoclearingservicesllc.com for information about our status and to help you obtain information about your account.

Our Business Continuity Plan – We plan to quickly recover and resume business operations after a significant business disruption and respond by safeguarding our employees and property, making a financial and operational assessment, protecting the firm’s books and records, and allowing our customers to transact business. In short, our business continuity plan is designed to permit our firm to resume operations as quickly as possible, given the scope and severity of the significant business disruption.

Our business continuity plan addresses: data backup and recovery; all mission critical systems; financial and operational assessments; alternative communications with customers, employees, and regulators; alternate physical location of employees; critical supplier, contractor, bank and counter-party impact; regulatory reporting; and assuring our customers prompt access to their funds and securities if we are unable to continue our business.

Our clearing firm, WFCS, backs up our important records in a geographically separate area. While every emergency situation poses unique problems based on external factors, such as time of day and the severity of the disruption, we have been advised by our clearing firm that its objective is to restore its own operations and be able to complete existing transactions and accept new transactions and payments within a 24 hour period. However, their business resumption objectives may be impacted by events outside of their control, such as when the market was closed following the September 11 tragedy, and your orders and requests for funds and securities could be delayed during this period.

Varying Disruptions – Significant business disruptions can vary in their scope, such as only our firm, a single building housing our firm, the business district where our firm is located, the city where we are located, or the whole region. Within each of these areas, the severity of the disruption can also vary from minimal to severe. In a disruption to only our firm or a building housing our firm, we will transfer our operations to a local site when needed and expect to recover and resume business within a matter of hours. In a disruption affecting our business district, city, or region, we will transfer our operations to a site outside of the affected area, and aim to resume business no later than the following business day. However, we should also inform you that our ability to continue operations after a longer term disruption could be impacted by factors outside of our control and the recovery time for such a significant disruption could extend beyond the next business day. If necessary, we will transfer operations to our clearing firm and notify you through our website [new url] how to contact us or how to arrange for access your funds and securities directly through WFCS.

For more information – If you have questions about our business continuity planning, please don’t hesitate to contact us by phone at (509) 624-3174 or 1-800-572-5296 or go to our website at [new url]. For more information on WFCS’s business continuity plan, please go to www.wellsfargoclearingservicesllc.com