SENTINEL REGULATORY MONITORING SERVICE - …

1 SENTINEL REGULATORY MONITORING SERVICE The REGULATORY challenge On average, companies are subject to between 120 and 210 different Acts of Parliament, depending on the nature of their operations. Each Act has one or more sets of subordinate legislation (regulations, directives, codes of practice, circulars and/or practice notes). Since 2000, on average 47 new Acts have been published per month, comprised of 19 Principal Acts, 25 Amendment Acts and 2 Repeal Acts. During 2011, 582 new REGULATORY developments (Acts, subordinate measures and REGULATORY circulars) were published that impacted on the average JSE listed company. That is a staggering new REGULATORY developments per business day! It is an almost impossible task for a company s legal and compliance functions to continuously monitor new REGULATORY developments as they are already under strain to give effect to these requirements and to monitor compliance.

2 While some law publishers provide subscribers with access to new laws, it is still up to you to scrutinise each new REGULATORY development to determine its relevance (if any) to and impact on your organisation. Our SERVICE ( SENTINEL ), as the name implies, provides a full time MONITORING , risk assessment and early warning system to each of our subscribers regarding all new REGULATORY developments published in South Africa, whether published by national, provincial or local government or by industry regulators. We summarise the REGULATORY developments into succinct, bite size, plain-language executive summaries (Alerts) which are available on the portal next to the full text of the underlying law. Alerts are generally provided within 24 to 48 hours of the law s publication. Customisation of areas of law to be updated on Each user can select from a list of +120 categories of law which categories they wish to be updated on.

3 This way you can ensure you keep updated only on matters that impact your business area. REGULATORY universe We identify all Principal Acts that apply to your organisation (directly or indirectly) and provide you with a breakdown of each, outlining the following (on a high level): Name of Act and year Preamble/Objectives Affected organisational areas Relevance to your organisation Level of importance. We monitor new Acts and the repeal of existing Acts and we update your REGULATORY Universe bi-annually in January and July of each year. Your REGULATORY Universe is a user friendly, quick reference guide for users and especially the board of directors to understand the REGULATORY spectrum within which the company operates. It is also a valuable contribution to the measures your company can take to prove to external auditors and shareholders that the company and board of directors are complying with the duties imposed by section 88(2)(b) of the new Companies Act, as well as Principle 6 of the King III Code on Corporate Governance.

4 REGULATORY Radar Each user has access to a fully updated database on the portal where an outline is provided of laws in the making, distinguishing between: Bills adopted by the National Assembly, sent for promulgation Bills tabled in Parliament (comment and public hearings) Bills approved by Cabinet but still to be tabled in Parliament Draft Bills published by Departments for comment White Papers, Green Papers, Issue Papers, Discussion Papers Rumour has it where we provide a list of laws in the making not yet published. You will be able to access the relevant Bill and determine its status. Users are able to select which Bills to be informed about once its status changes, a tabled Bill becoming an adopted Bill, etc. REGULATORY Comment Manager Users can submit comments via the portal on draft legislation published for comment.

5 You can then integrate the different contributions into your formal submission. Users can also invite views from other users on their proposed comment before submitting their final comments. REGULATORY Calendar Each user has access to an online calendar in the portal outlining the effective dates of new Acts/regulations or dates for comments/public hearings on Bills and draft regulations. The calendar can be used for REGULATORY planning. Users can also make their own entries in the calendar and set reminders, to submit comments on a Bill a week before the due date. Task Manager As we report to you on new REGULATORY developments, you may want to assign tasks to certain users from time to time. For example, you can instruct your legal department to review and, where necessary, update a certain policy. Alternatively, you can request that a branch manager ensures all staff are made aware of a new REGULATORY development.

6 You can determine which users should have the ability to assign tasks and we or your Primary Administrator can set that function in their user profiles. The task assignor can then select the users ( task assignee ) s/he assigns a task to. The task can be given an order of priority and a due date. Once assigned, the task assignee can update the assignor of progress via the portal. Weekly audit trail A weekly spreadsheet is provided containing the titles of Gazette notices and Gazette numbers of REGULATORY developments that had been Gazetted the previous week along with an indication of the ones for which we provided Alerts. This is for your audit trail purposes.