Reid & Associates LLC's policy is to respond to a Significant Business Disruption (SBD) by safeguarding employees’ lives and firm property, protecting all of the firm’s books and records, and allowing our customers to transact business.  In the event that we determine we are unable to continue our business, we will assure customers prompt access to their funds and securities.  Our firm’s “mission critical systems” are broken down into 3 areas: Order Taking, Order Entry, and Order Execution.  It is our firm’s major goal to ensure these systems are operational at all times.

In event of an internal or external SBD, Reid & Associates LLC will attempt to continue business without interruption during normal stock market hours of 9:30am to 4pm Monday thru Friday.   We will try to recover from any internal disruption within 1 hour.  Actual recovery time may be longer depending on the severity of the disruption, such as a firm-only disruption, or a city wide disruption, or a regional disruption.

Reid & Associates LLC has designated back-up facilities and arrangements with its clearing firm and other vendors in case of either an internal or external SBD. These facilities and arrangements include the use of telephone, fax, secure email, and internet access to electronic records.

In addressing the events of varying scope, our summary (1) provides specific scenarios of varying severity (e.g., a firm-only business disruption, a city-wide business disruption, and a regional disruption); (2) states whether we plan to continue business during that scenario and, if so, our planned recovery time; and (3) provides general information on our intended response.  Our summary discloses the existence of back-up facilities and arrangements.

Our response to external disruptions relies more heavily on other organizations and systems, especially on the capabilities of our clearing firm, First Clearing LLC.

Our firm does not maintain custody of customers’ funds or securities, which are maintained at our clearing firm, First Clearing LLC.  If telephone service is available, our registered persons will take customer orders or instructions and contact our clearing firm on their behalf through other methods such as fax or email with our clearing firm

We communicate daily with our customers using the telephone, fax, our website, U.S. mail, and in person visits at our firm. In the event of an internal or external SBD, we will assess which means of communication are still available to us, and use the means closest in speed and form (written or oral) to the means that we have used in the past to communicate with the other party. For example, if we have communicated with a party by e-mail but the Internet is unavailable, we will call them on the telephone and follow up where a record is needed with paper copy in the U.S. mail. 

We have contacted our critical business constituents and determined the extent to which we can continue our business relationship with them in light of the internal or external SBD.  We will quickly establish alternative arrangements if a business constituent can no longer provide the needed goods or services when we need them because of a SBD to them or our firm.

Our firm is subject to regulation by the FINRA and SEC. We now file reports with our regulators using paper copies in the U.S. mail, and electronically using fax, e-mail, and the Internet. In the event of a SBD, we will check with the SEC, FINRA, and other regulators to determine which means of filing are still available to us, and use the means closest in speed and form (written or oral) to our previous filing method.  In the event that we cannot contact our regulators, we will continue to file required reports using the communication means available to us.

Our Business Continuity Plan is subject to modification. We will update our BCP whenever we have a material change to our operations, structure, business or location or to those of our clearing firm. At the same time, an updated summary will be promptly posted on our website, www.reidtrade.com.  

Thank You.

Michael C Reid, BCP Officer, Reid & Associates LLC