Almost a month later Mr North received a statement from Comsec advising that in fact the sale had not gone through. In the meantime, the share price of the stock had plummeted and Mr North now says he would have sold his shares well before the end of that month to cut his losses of several thousand dollars. Comsec director Mr Paul Rickard said that it had a good record of resolving directly disputes with its clients. In Mr North's case we have resolved all outstanding matters except one and I am confident that this will soon be fixed also. The chief executive officer of the Financial Industry Complaint Service, Mr Paul Bean, said Mr North's case was one that would be suitable for hearing by the complaint service if it had the jurisdiction.
FICS officers can investigate and try to conciliate a complaint about a broker.
If this is unsuccessful then a special adjudicator or panel will arbitrate the matter and can make a binding ruling. Only those brokers who give retail advice to investors are required as a condition of their licence to be members. Since the online brokers do not give investment advice they are not required to be members. We agree that there is a problem at the moment. The whole industry should be covered and we have alerted ASIC to the situation.