SFO Provides Further Details of Hanover Investigation

SFO Provides Further Details of Hanover Investigation

Following last week’s announcement of the completion of its Hanover Finance investigation, the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) received a number of requests for details of the cost of that investigation.

As outlined in the 30 April media statement, the investigation comprised around 12,700 hours of work by SFO staff. SFO does not allocate its internal salary or overhead costs on a case by case basis, but the estimated cost of 12,700 hours’ work is approximately $600,000.

SFO was assisted in that work by external contractors supplementing SFO’s resources, expert advisors peer-reviewing and supplementing SFO’s expertise, and legal advisors from the SFO Prosecution Panel. Total external costs incurred were $505,111.40.  This is consistent with external costs incurred in SFO’s other flagship investigations such as Capital and Merchant Finance ($295,870.55) and South Canterbury Finance ($493,720.53 to date).

Acting SFO Chief Executive, Simon McArley said, “Investigations of this scale are expensive and time consuming.  However it is essential that we are able to make the commitment to this scale of investigation, so that a credible deterrent to offending is maintained.”

SFO has completed 15 investigations arising out of the collapse of the finance company sector.

“That collapse had a profound impact on many New Zealanders and rocked confidence in the integrity of our savings institutions and financial markets. I’m pleased that SFO been able to contribute to delivering a positive outcome in the vast majority of those cases, and in doing so begin to rebuild that confidence,” Simon McArley said.

ENDS

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