He later renamed the customer list file "Mum's recipe - Meat Loaf" to conceal it
No written contract, no restraint clause, no confidentiality agreement — and a departing manager who took the customer list on his way out.
That is the scenario at the heart of a recent New South Wales Supreme Court decision that should give every HR professional pause, particularly those working with small and medium-sized employers where paperwork often takes a back seat to getting the job done.
In Direct Flow Pty Ltd t/as Arthur Rubber v Petersen [2026] NSWSC 171, decided on 11 March 2026, Justice Richmond ruled that a former retail manager breached his equitable duty of confidence and his fiduciary duties to his employer after spending over a decade on the job without ever signing a written employment contract.
Andrew Petersen managed a rubber products retail business in Wagga Wagga from 2006 until he resigned in December 2017. During the 18 months before he left, the Court found he had been quietly laying the groundwork for a competing business. He registered his employer's trading name under his own ABN, built a new product catalogue and website using the company's brand, and downloaded a 50-page customer list with details of 1,841 clients from the business's MYOB system. He then opened his own shop, Maxx Rubber, around the corner.
When the employer's lawyers wrote to him in January 2018 asking him to return any confidential information, Petersen denied having any. He had kept the...
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