Testwith expert lawyers

Our experienced lawyers can advise you on your customer contracts and how to comply with consumer law, helping reduce the risk of fines or penalties. This can give you peace of mind as you continue running your business.

Our fixed-fee Australian Consumer Law Consultation packages start at $200.00 + GST. This includes a phone consultation with a Sprintlaw lawyer to guide you through how to make sure your customer contracts comply with New Zealand Consumer Law.

Sprintlaw operates in Australia, New Zealand and the UK. In Australia, Sprintlaw is a regulated law firm and is an incorporated legal practice with number 32845, regulated by the Law Society of New South Wales.

In New Zealand and the UK, Sprintlaw operates as a legal consultancy rather than a traditionally regulated law firm. We chose this model in New Zealand because it made our expansion into the New Zealand market faster and easier, reduced our compliance burden, and allowed us to lower our overheads when performing legal work. We can then pass those cost savings on to our clients, helping us provide high quality legal services at a fraction of the cost of traditional firms.

So what is the difference between Sprintlaw NZ’s consultancy model and a traditional NZ law firm? In many respects, we are similar. Like a law firm, we offer legal services to small business clients across most of their regular legal needs, including drafting and reviewing contracts and providing legal and regulatory advice.

However, there are some important differences and limitations to be aware of.

Our lawyers: The legal services we provide in New Zealand are not provided by New Zealand-qualified lawyers. Our lawyers are Australian-qualified or UK-qualified lawyers who are familiar with New Zealand laws and requirements, and are able to provide high quality legal services to New Zealand businesses. Given the strong similarities between Australian, English and New Zealand law, and the areas of law in which we practise, 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.

Reserved areas: We are not permitted to provide services in reserved areas of law under section 6 and section 35 of the Lawyers and Conveyancers Act 2006 (see here). These include appearing in court or conducting litigation proceedings, managing conveyancing matters, or giving advice under the Property (Relationships) Act 1976. As such, Sprintlaw does not operate in these areas. We find these areas are rarely relevant to small business clients seeking commercial legal advisory services.

Privilege: When working with traditional law firms, advice provided is considered “privileged”. This means correspondence between a client and solicitor can, if made confidentially and for the purposes of legal advice, be withheld from a court or third party in connection with litigation proceedings. As Sprintlaw operates as a legal consultancy, some advice we provide may not be “privileged” and may instead be treated in the same way as advice from your accountant or another adviser who is not a regulated adviser such as a solicitor or barrister. This does not affect our confidentiality obligations to you, and our engagement letter confirms that any advice or discussions we have will be kept confidential. Given that Sprintlaw does not operate in court-related or litigious matters, we find that privilege is rarely an issue for the kind of legal work we do.

Insurance: Sprintlaw is not required to have professional indemnity insurance that meets the New Zealand Law Society’s minimum requirements. Regardless, Sprintlaw has chosen to maintain professional indemnity cover so our clients still benefit from insurance protection.

If you have any questions about this, our team would be happy to discuss them with you.

We support clients across New Zealand through our online-first model. Because we work remotely by phone, email and video call, you can use Sprintlaw from anywhere in New Zealand. Where relevant, we can also support businesses operating across Australia, the UK and other Sprintlaw markets.