Importer terms and conditions for New Zealand businesses buying from overseas

Usually when the business is doing more than placing occasional orders on a supplier's standard paperwork. If you import regularly, hold stock, resell goods, work with multiple overseas suppliers or need consistent rules on delivery, shortages, damage, inspection and payment, your own terms become much more important. They can also help where responsibility is split across suppliers, freight providers and local customers. Without a clear document, important points may be left to conflicting emails, invoices or supplier terms that do not reflect how your operation actually runs.

They commonly deal with how orders are placed and accepted, pricing, payment timing, shipping and delivery assumptions, title and risk, inspection on arrival, claims for damaged or missing goods, delays, force majeure-style disruptions, warranties, returns, liability allocation, termination and how disputes are handled under the contract. Depending on your model, the terms may also need to refer to storage, third-party logistics, product information, customer communications and information sharing with service providers. The drafting is shaped by the actual trade flow, not just by the fact that goods are imported.

We usually need a practical summary of how your import business works. That includes what goods you import, whether they are standard or made to specification, who your counterparties are, how orders are confirmed, who arranges freight, when you treat goods as accepted, how defects are reported, whether you resell locally, and whether you already use purchase orders or supplier terms. If warehousing, fulfilment or customer data is involved, that may also affect the wording because the right drafting depends on how information is actually collected, used and shared in practice.

Once instructed, we will ask for the main commercial details and any current terms, quotes, order forms or supplier documents you use. We then prepare draft importer terms that reflect the structure of your trading arrangements and identify any clauses that need your commercial decision. Timing depends on complexity and how quickly instructions are confirmed, but the work is aimed at producing the core document efficiently. The fixed-fee covers drafting and agreed amendments, not ongoing contract administration or back-and-forth negotiations with overseas counterparties.

Often not. Generic templates tend to stay at a high level and may not deal properly with shipment delays, partial deliveries, inspection windows, landed cost assumptions, damaged stock, or the handover points between supplier, carrier, warehouse and buyer. They also may not fit your sales model if you import for resale, import on demand, or combine imported goods with local services. A tailored document is usually more useful where your margins, stock risk or customer commitments depend on getting those practical points stated clearly.

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 Importer Terms And Conditions 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.