Ts & Cs

Content Protection- Terms & Conditions

Overview:

The information and content contained in this site is the property of “Ponsonby Chambers.” All information is factual and accurate to the best of our knowledge and belief at the time of publishing and is automatically protected by copyright law.

Nothing on this site, written content or images may be reproduced or shared in any capacity without the express written consent of the founder on a case by case basis.

“Ponsonby Chambers” are not qualified solicitors we make this clear in our tag line: “You can trust us, we aren’t lawyers.” The information provided is based off practical experience of self litigants for members to make informed decisions in representing themselves or instructing solicitors who they employ to represent them.

“Ponsonby Chambers” and all founders and employees waives any liability for loss or damages of any kind that may be incurred as a result of any information provided or acted on at the discretion of the members. As always, your conduct and consequences throughout any court proceedings are done so at your own risk. We will not tolerate any harassment, bullying, threats or intimidation of any kind. Any conduct deemed to be unacceptable will result in immediate termination of membership and possible legal action for the safety of our staff and members.

Any breach of the terms and conditions of this site will result in immediate cancellation of membership without refund and offenders will be liable for prosecution- any redistribution or publishing of content without the owners written consent is strictly prohibited.

The membership access is designed to be rolling subscriptions with ongoing access- the use of which is entirely the responsibility of each member. The access to information the membership allows is exclusively for the use of individuals who are members and MUST NOT be reproduced or shared. Breach of this will result in immediate termination of membership without refund and potentially infringement fines and legal action.

Membership can be cancelled at any time by the member in writing with 2 weeks notice.

What Ponsonby Chambers will do for you

We will keep you informed about changes as we become aware of them across the courts and judicial appointments.

We will share useful legislation and precedents as they are available [some of which exclusive to us and not publicly available]

We will protect peoples confidentiality and not reveal our sources of information in accordance with their rights to privacy under the Privacy Act 2020.

We will commit to at least one new publication in our “Is It PC?” Blog posts, some of which is password protected with subscription only access- [ included in any of the 3 memberships of our website.]

If you have any questions or concerns about what we are doing, please contact us so we can discuss this. [Any abusive, threatening, derogatory or intimidation will not be tolerated and will result in immediate termination of access with no refunds.]

If you are enquiring about case by case individual assistance and about how much the work will cost, we will provide an estimate of our costs based on the work we will need to do. If this changes we will work with you at each stage to avoid eliciting costs without your consent.

What we need from you

Please be thorough when you confirm your requirements. It is important so that we can tailor our response to you. Please keep up to date with your payments, defaulting will result in the immediate termination of your access and depending on the amount and dealings, possible referral to debt collection, of which all additional fees [direct and indirect will be your sole responsibility to cover]Please provide all the information we need to act on your behalf and advise us of any changes to your circumstances, as this may affect the advice you require.

Additional TERMS OF ENGAGEMENT

1 General

1. These Standard Terms of Engagement (Terms) apply to any current engagement and also to any future engagement, whether or not we send you another copy of them. We are entitled to change these Terms autonomously, in which case we will update these changes on our site with amended Terms. Our relationship with you as a client/ customer is governed by New Zealand law , including consumer rights and the Fair Trade Act 1986.

2 Services

2.1 The services we are to provide for you (the Services) are outlined in our letter of engagement and the products page of our site- as our products and services expand you will be notified via the web site.

3 Communications

3.1 We will obtain from you contact details, including email address, postal address and telephone numbers. We may provide documents and other communications to you by email (or other electronic means). Failure for you to advise us if any of your contact details change will result in this communication being lost.  

3.2 You agree that we may provide you with other information that may be relevant to you, such as newsletters and information bulletins. At any time you may “opt out” of this communication and/or simply mark our emails as “spam”

4 Financial

4.1 The basis upon which we will charge our fees is set out in our engagement letter and the check out identifying the clauses.

4.2 BE AWARE OF LEGAL FEES OF SOLICITORS WHO ARE ABLE TO ROUND UP AND INFLATE COSTS BASED ON: Rule 9 of 2 the Lawyers and Conveyancers Act (Lawyers: Conduct and Client Care) Rules 2008 (Rules).”  “Hourly fees may be adjusted (upwards or downwards) to ensure the fee is fair and reasonable to take into account matters such as the complexity, urgency, value and importance of the Services.

4.3 As we are not solicitors we do not partake in this practice.

4.4 GST: Our services will not attract Goods and Services Tax (GST) until we are legally required to collect these and we will do our best to ensure the tax is taken out of existing amount to avoid further price hikes for affordable access.. When this is the case, GST is payable by you on our fees and charges.

4.5 Invoices: We will send invoices to you electronically via the website, you will have access to your order history in your account.

4.6 Payment: of customised products or services whereby, we manually generate an invoice based on your request, Invoices are payable within 7 days of the date of the invoice, unless alternative arrangements have been approved by us.

i)  Payment may be made by electronic payment to bank number 12-3436-0021439-00

4.7 Estimates: You may request an estimate of our fee for undertaking the Services at any time. If possible we will provide you with an estimate (which may be a range between a minimum and a maximum amount or for a particular task or step). An estimate is not a quote.

4.8 Third Parties: Although you may expect to be reimbursed by a third party for our fees and expenses, and although our invoices may at your request or with your approval be directed to a third party, you remain responsible for payment to us in accordance with these Terms if the third party fails to pay us. [and any additional expense retrieving these funds may incur including but not limited to third party debt collection agencies.]

5 Confidentiality and Personal Information

5.1 Confidence: We will hold in confidence all information concerning you or your affairs that we acquire during the course of working with you. We will not disclose any of this information to any other person except: a to the extent necessary.

b) as agreed by you; or

c) as necessary to protect our interests in respect of any complaint or dispute; or d to the extent required or permitted by law.

5.2 Confidential information concerning you will be protected and the same level of confidentiality with your access to our site and resources is expected:

*Note: Your password and access to our site and all resources this allows your access to, is exclusively for your personal use, any sharing of this content or access with anyone else will result in termination of your membership and possible fines should our company experience loss as a result of this.

5.3 Personal information and Privacy: In our dealings with you we will collect and hold personal information about you. We will use that information to carry out the Services and to make contact with you about issues we believe may be of interest to you. Provision of personal information is voluntary but if you do not provide full information this may impact on our ability to provide the Services.

5.4 Subject to clause 5.1, you authorise us to disclose, in the normal course of performing the Services, such personal information to third parties for the purpose of providing the Services and any other purposes set out in these Terms.

5.5 We may disclose your name and address to third parties such as credit agencies to perform a credit reference or to undertake credit management or collection processes if it is reasonable to do so.

5.6 The information we collect and hold about you will be kept at our offices and/or at secure file storage sites (including electronic file storage sites) elsewhere. If you are an individual, you have the right to access and correct this information. If you require access, please contact [email protected]

5.7 Verification of identity: The Financial Transactions Reporting Act 1996 requires us to collect from you and to retain information required to verify your identity. We may therefore ask you to show us documents verifying your identity (such as a passport or driver’s licence). We may retain copies of these documents. We may perform such other customer verification checks as to your identity and checks as to the source of any funds associated with any transaction to which the Services relate as we consider to be required by law.

5.8 Compliance: Please refer to section 7 ‘Compliance’ regarding information that may be required to be provided to third parties.

6 Documents, Records and Information

 6.1 We will keep a record of all important documents which we receive or create on your behalf on the following basis- we retain the intellectual property and automatic copyrights of all documentation we produce that cannot be lawfully circulated or used, published publicly without our written consent:

a We may keep a record electronically and destroy originals.

b At any time, we may dispose of documents which are duplicates, or which are trivial (such as emails which do not contain substantive information), or documents which belong to us.

c We are not obliged to retain documents or copies where you have requested that we provide them to you or to another person and we have done so, although we are entitled to retain copies for our own records if we wish to do so.

6.2 We are under no obligation to retain specific documents and owe no requirement to store every members information or useful documentation- you are solely responsible for maintaining your accurate and up to date records. If we can assist we will, but this is not a requirement.

6.3 Where we hold documents that belong to a third party you will need to provide us with that party’s written authority to uplift or obtain a copy of that document.

6.4 Unless you instruct us in writing otherwise, you authorise us and consent to us (without further reference to you) to destroy (or delete in the case of electronic records) all files and documents in respect of the Services 7 years after our engagement ends (other than any documents that we hold in safe custody for you or are otherwise obliged by law to retain for longer). We may retain documents for longer at our discretion.

6.5 We own copyright and Intellectual Property Ownership of all documents we work on and create in the course of performing the Service. You are strictly prohibited from permitting [willingly or by negligence] any third party to copy, adapt or use the documents without our company Owners written permission.

7 Compliance

7.1 We are obliged to comply with all laws applicable to us in all jurisdictions, including (but not limited to):

a Anti-money laundering (AML) and countering financing of terrorism (CFT) laws; and

b Laws relating to tax and client reporting and withholdings.

7.2 We may be required to undertake customer due diligence on you, persons acting on your behalf and other relevant persons such as beneficial owners and controlling persons. We may not be able to begin acting, or to continue acting, for you until that is completed.

7.3 To ensure our compliance and yours, we may be required to provide information about you, persons acting on your behalf or other relevant persons to third parties (such as government agencies). There may be circumstances where we are not able to tell you or such persons if we do provide information.

7.4 Please ensure that you and/or any of the persons described previously are aware of and consent to this. It is important to ensure that all information provided to us is accurate. If the 5 information required is not provided, or considered by us to be potentially inaccurate, misleading, or in contravention of any law, we may terminate or refuse to enter into an engagement.

8 Conflicts of Interest

8.1 We are obliged to protect and promote your interests to the exclusion of the interests of third parties and ourselves as set out in the Consumer Guarantee Act. This may result in a situation arising where we have a conflict of interest which we will notify you of as soon as practicable for you to make an informed decision to proceed with our services or not.

8.2 We have procedures in place to identify and respond to conflicts of interest or potential conflicts of interest. If a conflict of interest arises we will advise you of this and follow the requirements and procedures set out in our code of conduct and policies and procedures manual.

9 Duty of Care

9.1 Our duty of care is to you and not to any other person. We owe no liability to any other person, including for example any directors, shareholders, associated companies, employees or family members unless we expressly agree in writing. We do not accept any responsibility or liability whatsoever to any third parties who may be affected by our performance of the Services or who may rely on any advice we give.

9.2 Our advice is not to be referred to in connection with any prospectus, financial statement, or public document without our written consent.

9.3 Our advice is opinion only, based on the facts known to us and on our professional judgement, and is subject to any changes in the law after the date on which the advice is given. We are not liable for errors in, or omissions from, any information provided by third parties.

9.4 Our advice relates only to each particular matter in respect of which you engage us. We will not owe you any duty or liability in respect of any related or other matters unless you specifically engage us in respect of those related or other matters and only in the scope of which we agree.

9.5 Unless otherwise agreed, we may communicate with you and with others by electronic means. We cannot guarantee that these communications will not be lost or affected for some reason beyond our reasonable control, and we will not be liable for any damage or loss caused thereby.

10 Termination

10.1 You may terminate your membership of access to our products and services at any time. Upon engaging you are required to make a 4 weekly payment and the provide 2 weeks notice of cancellation at which point [after the 2 weeks- 14 days] all debits will cease for our services.]

10.2 We may terminate your membership if you breach any of our terms and conditions without warning, discussion and without any refund.

11 Feedback and Complaints

11.1 Member satisfaction, safety and the empowerment for your success is our primary objectives and feedback from clients is essential for us to continue to grow and improve on the services and products we can offer you. If you would like to comment on any aspect of the service provided by us, including how we can improve our service, please contact us on [email protected]

11.2 If you have any concerns or complaints about our services, please raise them as soon as possible with us in order to assist, dispute resolution to prevent instances are ideal for everyone involved and if we are able to mitigate any disagreement we will do our best.

11.3 If you are not satisfied with the way we have dealt with your complaint the Consumer Rights Commission can assist you with any complaints and resolution processes available. To find out more about consumer rights visit: https://www.consumerprotection.govt.nz/general-help/consumer-rights-finder/products/?gclid=EAIaIQobChMI49r96ML0gwMVfBmDAx0XXwZREAAYASAAEgIKlvD_BwE

11.11 We encourage all clients and the public to be aware of their rights and avenues to pursue in accordance with legislation- and provide the following links from the consumer rights website:

Get support at any point from:

• Citizens Advice Bureau (CAB) — a free, independent service, run by volunteers. CAB can advise you on your consumer rights and obligations, in person, by phone, or online.
• Community Law Centre — offers free one-on-one legal advice to people with limited finances. The organisation has 24 community law centres throughout the country. You can find legal information and other resources on its website.
• MoneyTalks — gives free budgeting advice to individuals, family and whānau. Financial mentors can help you understand your financial situation, organise your debt plan. They can also put you in touch with a local budgeting service and help you address issues you’re having with lenders. Contact them on 0800 345 123. Or by live chat, email or text if you prefer.

Find a CAB (external link)— Citizens Advice Bureau

Our law centres(external link)  — Community Law Centres

Contact information(external link)  — MoneyTalks

By purchasing any membership or product you hereby agree to the terms and conditions set out here in and the other Ts & Cs, Privacy Disclosure and Returns information.