Set the ground rules for a project with a clear statement of work

This service is commonly used by consultants, agencies, developers, designers, specialist contractors and businesses buying project-based services. It is especially useful where the deal involves staged work, technical deliverables, milestones, acceptance criteria or changing requirements over time. A short email chain or quote often leaves too much open to interpretation once the project is underway. A proper SOW records the practical detail in one place, so both sides can see what is included, what is excluded and how changes are meant to be handled.

The main issues are usually scope creep, unclear deliverables, payment triggers, ownership of work product, responsibility for delays, and what happens if assumptions turn out to be wrong. A well-structured SOW can also deal with dependencies, client approvals, service levels, acceptance testing, variation requests, and termination consequences. Those points matter because many project disagreements are really disagreements about expectations. We help shape the SOW so the commercial arrangement is recorded more precisely, rather than leaving key project terms to informal messages or broad proposal wording.

The fixed-fee includes legal work on one statement of work, whether that means drafting a new document or reviewing an existing one. We can help with scope descriptions, deliverables, payment structure, liability wording, intellectual property treatment, service levels and exit mechanics. If your SOW is meant to sit under a broader contract, we can also flag obvious consistency issues between the two documents. The service includes one round of amendments, but it does not automatically include a full rewrite of related agreements or ongoing negotiation with the other side.

Yes. In many commercial arrangements, the master agreement sets the general legal framework while each SOW records the project-specific detail. That can work well, but only if the documents line up properly. For example, the SOW should not accidentally contradict the main contract on payment timing, IP ownership, acceptance, liability caps or termination rights. If you already have a broader services agreement in place, we can review the SOW against it and flag where the project wording may create tension or uncertainty.

The most useful materials are the proposal or quote, any master services agreement, emails recording the deal, the project brief, pricing information, milestone details, and notes on deliverables or acceptance criteria. If the project involves software, creative work or confidential information, it also helps to explain who is supplying inputs and who should own the outputs. The clearer the commercial background, the easier it is to draft or review an SOW that reflects the actual project rather than a generic template.

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 Statement Of Work Pack 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.