Set the rules for contractor placements before issues surface

A contractor placement arrangement is not just a standard services contract. It needs to reflect the agency's role in introducing or placing the contractor, the client's expectations, and the contractor's obligations. If those moving parts are left vague, problems can arise around fees, replacement expectations, responsibility for conduct on site, and who is handling personal information at each stage. A dedicated agreement helps set the commercial ground rules early. It You will get a clear view of the legal issues and the next steps that matter. if the real-world arrangement points the other way.

These agreements commonly deal with placement fees or margins, invoicing and payment timing, the contractor's status in the arrangement, confidentiality, privacy-related wording, responsibilities between the agency and client, and limits on liability. They may also address replacement scenarios, non-circumvention concerns, record keeping, and what happens if the placement ends early. The exact drafting depends on whether your agency is simply introducing the contractor or staying involved in administration and communications throughout the placement. That factual context can materially change what the document needs to say.

Important details include whether you place contractors directly or through another entity, who contracts with whom, how timesheets or approvals are handled, who invoices the client, and whether your agency holds or shares candidate and contractor information. The wording should reflect the information your business collects, the reasons it is used and the parties it is shared with. We also look at whether the contractor works under the client's day-to-day direction, because the factual working arrangement can matter as much as the contract wording when risk is being assessed.

A generic template may cover basic payment and termination clauses, but it often misses the practical issues that make contractor placements different from simple referrals or ordinary supplier arrangements. For example, it may not deal properly with the three-party dynamic, information flows, replacement requests, or how responsibility is divided if something goes wrong during the placement. A tailored agreement is useful where your agency has a specific placement process or sector focus. If you already have a template, it can often be used as a starting point, but it usually needs adjustment.

Timing depends on how settled your placement model is and how much detail is available about your current process. Once we have your instructions, we prepare the agreement and send it through for your review. If there are points that need refining, we work through those as part of the drafting process. The fixed-fee covers the agreement described on this page. It does not include ongoing representation, dispute work, or broader HR support. If you need related advice outside the document itself, that can be discussed separately.

Just submit an enquiry via this page or click the 'get started' button on our website to submit an enquiry. After you've submitted an enquiry, one of our legal consultants will review your enquiry within 1 business day and get in touch to get a better idea of exactly what you are looking for.

Then your legal consultant will send through an email with a bit more information about the services you need, along with a fixed fee quote setting out costs, scope of the service and timing. Have a read through it, and if you're happy with the scope, you can accept and sign our engagement letter online - easy!

Once you've formally accepted, we'll connect you with a specialist lawyer and they will work with you to complete your project. They will contact you by email or phone if they need to get in touch.

Sprintlaw works on fixed-fee pricing wherever possible, so you can review the scope and cost before you decide whether to proceed. For the Contractor Placement Agreement service, pricing starts from $900.00.

After you enquire, a legal consultant will confirm what is included, the expected timing and whether any extra work is needed before you engage us.

We operate completely online, which means we can help you wherever you are in New Zealand. We have office spaces in Sydney, and in Melbourne, but our use of technology allows our team members to work remotely from around the world. Our legal team are mostly based in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth. We also have a London office for Sprintlaw UK.

Our legal team is made up of experienced lawyers, who are specialists in various areas of law and hold an Australian legal practising certificate. None of our Sprintlaw lawyers are New Zealand qualified lawyers and they do not currently hold a New Zealand practising certificate.

They provide legal services working remotely from Australia via our 'legal consultancy' model, through which (under section 6 and section 35 of the New Zealand Lawyers and Conveyancers Act 2006) our Australian legal team are permitted to provide legal services to New Zealand businesses provided they do not provide services in certain 'reserved' areas of law. You can read our FAQ page to learn a bit more about our 'legal consultancy' model.

Given the strong similarities between Australian and New Zealand law, and the areas of law in which we practice (being small business and startup law), we do not view the fact that our lawyers have not qualified in New Zealand as having any substantive impact on the quality of our service. We are committed to ensuring that we provide high quality, affordable legal services to all our New Zealand clients.

Our legal team have all trained at leading firms, but have left the traditional corporate law world to join us on our mission to create a new and better way of delivering legal services. They have specialist expertise in technology law, intellectual property law, contract drafting and review, corporate law and commercial law.