Gift and Entertainment Rules and Reporting Policy



Gifts and Entertainment

- Rules

- Reporting

Table of Contents

Overview 3

Gifts and Entertainment Rules Error! Bookmark not defined.

To whom does this policy apply? 4

Which gifts or entertainment require pre-approval? Error! Bookmark not defined.

What are unacceptable gifts and entertainment? Error! Bookmark not defined.

What if my department has special rules? Error! Bookmark not defined.

Are there special rules for Government Officials? 4

What gifts and entertainment have to be recorded? 4

What does not have to be recorded? 4

Guidelines for Reviewers,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,5

Using this Database 6

Creating a new Gift Log Entry and Completing the Gift Log Form 6

Date of Event 10

Type of event 10

Description 11

Given to/Received from 11

Business Relationship 11

Did Host Attend? 11

Approximate Value 11

Was value pre-approved? 12

Additional Information 12

Submitting a Gift Log Entry 12

Saving a draft Gift Log Entry for future submission Error! Bookmark not defined.

What happens once you “Submit” 14

The Review Process 14

Approved 15

Approved with Comments 15

Not Approved with Comments 16

Overview

Gifts are a normal part of business life. Buying a meal for a customer or receiving flowers from a vendor are acceptable business practices that foster goodwill and create lasting relationships. But we must be careful. The exchange of gifts and entertainment in connection with a business transaction should never imply an intention to seek or receive favorable treatment. Even if there is no deliberate intention to influence the outcome, the perception of bad intention could still be damaging for you personally and for the Company.

Integrity, the Company’s Standards of Business Conduct, provides guidelines for giving and accepting gifts and entertainment to or from parties outside of New York Life. The policy goal is to help make sure that all business transactions are impartial and objective, without outside influence.

What are acceptable and unacceptable gifts and entertainment?

Gifts, meals or entertainment are acceptable, provided all of the following are met:

• It is consistent with accepted business practice

• The gift or entertainment could not be perceived as a bribe, does not make the recipient feel obligated, or make it difficult for the recipient to make a fair decision; and

• Public disclosure of the gift or entertainment would not embarrass the Company

The following gifts or entertainment are considered unacceptable:

• Cash or its equivalent. For example, a gift certificate is not acceptable.

• Gifts that are solicited or encouraged by the employee.

• Transportation expenses paid by anyone other than the Company, including current or proposed vendors or service providers, (e.g. even if an employee is invited to be on a vendor “advisory board”).

• Gifts and entertainment that are so extensive or frequent as to raise questions of propriety.

To whom does this policy apply?

This policy applies to employees of New York Life Insurance Company. New York Life International and New York Life Investment Management have separate policies.

Are there special rules for Government Officials?

Laws regarding gifts and the entertainment of federal, state or local public officials are complex and vary widely from state to state and locality to locality. Before giving a gift to, or entertaining a federal, state, or local government official please call John O’Byrne at ext. 6556.

What gifts and entertainment have to be recorded or pre-approved?

All gifts and entertainment valued at $10 or more are reportable. When practical, entertainment given or received and gifts given that are expected to exceed $100 require pre-approval from your Department Head or an executive officer designated by the Department Head. Third party invitations for entertainment hosted at locations outside of the local business location in which the outside party is paying some or all the cost of the trip (e.g. hotels, meals, entertainment, tickets to sporting events, etc.) require the written pre-approval of your EMC member. Transportation expenses should always be paid by the Company.

What does not have to be recorded?

Employees do not have to report gifts and entertainment under the following situations:

• Entertainment given to New York Life agents and their guests – unless your

area is required to report this information for regulatory purposes

• Business related gifts and entertainment provided by fellow employees or by the Company or Department

• Commemorative items such as an inscribed paperweight, plaque or crystal bowl received to commemorate a special event or a product/company promotion

• Personal gifts between employees

• Entertainment including meals received at industry meetings if the Department already paid an admission or attendance charge for the meeting

Guidelines for Reviewers

The above rules and these reviewer guidelines are intended to assist reviewers when they are asked to pre-approve entertainment, or when you are reviewing the departmental logs. Of course, after consulting with John O’Byrne in COBC, individual department heads can establish more stringent guidelines for their departments. For example, some department heads have adopted a no gift policy and require all gifts to be returned to the giver.

Please note that the online reporting method has not been programmed to check each report for compliance with Company policy and/or compliance requirements. That is still the responsibility of the reviewer.

Review Process

The reviewer has three choices for the disposition of a gift and entertainment log entry. The reviewer can: 1) approve the reported gift/entertainment, 2) approve it with comments if he or she wants to give the employee future instructions or caution about additional gifts or entertainment to/from the same vendor, or 3) not approve with comments. If a gift is rejected, John O’Byrne from COBC will work with the reviewer and employee for an appropriate disposition of the matter. The system automatically notifies the employee and COBC of the reviewer’s action.

It is not always practical to obtain pre-approval for entertainment over $100. Therefore, the system gives the employee an opportunity to give a reason for not obtaining pre-approval. You can judge the employee’s explanation and if you disagree with the reason for not obtaining pre-approval, you can advise them accordingly.

Guidelines

Department heads should consider limiting the number of employees who are entertained by an outside party at a single event.

Gifts beyond a modest standard need special consideration. For example, a bottle of moderately priced wine is acceptable; a case of wine may not be acceptable. The point at which a gift or entertainment should be disapproved or approved depends on the employee’s job (e.g., are they the key decision-maker for the relationship with the vendor?), their experience, and their job level.

The frequency of entertainment may make it unacceptable. For example, golf outings or dinner with the same vendor once a month would be reason to caution an employee against additional entertainment with the same vendor.

Even if a gift or entertainment is otherwise acceptable, the reviewer must consider the location or venue involved. For example, meals or entertainment at so called “adult oriented establishments,” must be considered unacceptable.

When deciding if any entertainment is acceptable, a reviewer must always consider the following criteria:

Would giving or accepting any gift or entertainment cause the employee to act contrary to the best interests of New York Life and its customers?

Would giving or accepting any gift or entertainment cause embarrassment or any harm to the employee or to New York Life?

If you can answer “yes” to either of these questions, the gift or entertainment is unacceptable.

Advice

Contact John O’Byrne on extension 6556 in COBC for guidance with specific situations.

Using the Database

The remainder of this document is intended to provide users who will be completing Gift Log entries and the reviewers who will be approving them with information on how to complete each section of the form.

Creating a new Gift Log Entry and Completing the Gift Log Form

To add a new entry, CLICK the create New Log Entry link.

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You will then be presented with the following Gift Log form. The Employee Name field will automatically pre-populate your name, which in turn, provides your Department, Division/Office, Cost Center and Reviewer information. Most of this information originates from the Lotus Notes Directory.

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If any of the above information is incorrect, click on the link for COBC Gift Log Administration.

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By taking this action, your entry will be flagged as having “problem information” and you will automatically be bumped out to a blank web email form addressed to the COBC Gift Log. You should describe in detail, the problems that exist with your personal information. Once you’ve completed this step, go back to your Gift Log form and “save as draft” for future submission.

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If you are making an authorized entry for another individual (e.g. an administrative assistant submitting information for his/her manager), simply click on the “Different Employee” link to bring up the employee lookup form.

Enter all, or part, of the last name of the employee you want to submit an entry for and click “Find”.

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You will be presented with a name or list of names matching your name search. Click on the name you want to create an entry for.

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The name is added to the Gift Log form. Click “Update” to get the employee information for the different name.

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The form will display the employee information for the new individual.

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Once the correct individual information has been selected, you may then begin entering information on the lower section of the form.

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Within this section, you need to indicate via a radio button selection whether a government or union official was involved in the transaction.

Date of Event

Indicate the exact date date you received the gift, service or entertainment within this field. The date must be in the format MM/DD/YYYY. You may manually enter the date or use the date selection calendar. Simply click the “Add/Change Date” link.

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You will be presented with a calendar. Use the back or forward button to choose the year and month. Click the day of the gift event and the date is added to the form. This same method can be used to change the date.

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Type of event

Within this section, you need to indicate whether the item or service given/received is either a gift or entertainment. A gift is an item that is given or received outright by a NYL employee. Entertainment is an item that is given or received by a NYL employee that also includes participation by the individual who has provided the item (i.e. host). (Ex. Receiving Yankee tickets from a vendor is considered a gift; receiving Yankee tickets from a vendor and he/she goes to the game with you is considered entertainment.)

Description

This is a free text field that will allow you to provide clarifying information on the gift or entertainment received.

Given to/Received from

This field is where you would identify the outside company or individual that provided or received the gift or entertainment.

Business Relationship

This field allows you to describe and provide additional information as to your affiliation with the outside company or individual that provided or received the gift or entertainment.

Did Host Attend?

(Please refer to the type of event section above for additional information on hosts and the difference between gifts and entertainment)

If the item received is considered entertainment, you need to indicate whether the host attended. If the answer is “no,” you will need to provide an explanation as to why the host did not attend in the Host Explanation section.

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Approximate Value

This area allows you to provide, in dollar amounts, the approximate face or market value of the gift or entertainment item given or received.

Was value pre-approved?

Indicate here whether you received pre-approval prior to completing this form from your department head or his/her designee. As mentioned above within the Gifts and Entertainment Rules (Which gifts require pre-approval?) any gift, service or entertainment, given or received, that is expected to exceed $100 requires pre-approval from your Department Head or an executive officer designated by the Department Head. While there may be limited instances where pre-approval was not obtained, it still remains your responsibility to notify your department head or executive officer of the transaction.

Additional Information

This field is reserved for additional comments that would help to clarify the circumstances surrounding the gift or entertainment given or received. Submitting a Gift Log Entry

Submitting a Gift Log Entry

Once you are ready to submit your Gift Log entry for approval, click the “Submit” button at the bottom of the form.

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This will validate the form and forward your entry to the assigned reviewer for your department. In most cases, this will be either your immediate report and/or your division/department head.

Saving a draft Gift Log Entry for future submission

If for any reason, you are not ready to submit your entry after you’ve begun to complete the form, you can elect to save your information by clicking the “Save as Draft” button at the bottom of the form.

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This will save your information in your “Draft entries” view.

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When you are ready to complete and submit your entry, you must open the “Draft entries” or “Other draft entries” link. Then click the entry you want to edit.

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Click on “Edit Draft” to release the draft.

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Finally, once you’ve made all of your changes, you can now click on the “Submit” button as described in the previous section. Also, keep in mind that once your Gift Log form is submitted, you will no longer be able to make additional changes to the form.

What happens once you “Submit”

Once your Gift Log form is completed and you click on the “Submit” button, an e-mail is automatically sent to the individual that has been identified as the reviewer for your area. Once the reviewer clicks on the link in his/her e-mail they will be presented with the completed Gift Log form. At this point, the review process begins.

The Review Process

After opening the link and reviewing the completed Gift Log form, the reviewer will need to click the “Review” button on the form to submit their response.

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The following choices will appear.

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The reviewer is presented with three options:

1. Approved/Approved with Comments – the gift/entertainment is approved as entered or the gift/entertainment is approved as entered and comments have been added.

2. Not Approved with Comments – the gift/entertainment is not approved and comments must be provided

3. Cancel – exit the review process leaving the entry in a Pending Review state.

Approved

Simply click the “Approved/Approved with Comments” option. You will be presented with this confirmation box. Click OK. An e-mail will automatically be sent to the employee informing them of your approval.

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Approved with Comments

1. Scroll to the bottom of the entry and add your comments in the space provided.

2. Click “Approve/Approve with Comments”. You will be presented with this confirmation box. Click OK. An email will be sent to the employee and the COBC Gift Log administrators. The COBC Gift Log administrators are interested in all comments concerning gifts and entertainment.

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Not Approved with Comments

1. Scroll to the bottom of the entry and add your comments in the space provided.

2. Click “Not Approved with Comments”. You will be presented with this confirmation box. Click OK. An email will be sent to the employee and the COBC Gift Log administrators. The COBC Gift Log administrators need to be aware of gifts and entertainment not approved.

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If you have any questions regarding the gift log rules, or something that this User Guide does not address, contact John O’Byrne (x6556 in the Home Office) in the Corporate Office of Business Conduct.

If you encounter any technical problems while using this database, contact the SRC (82-3600 in CNJ).

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