General

Your relationship with our firm shall be governed by these Terms of Engagement unless with expressly agree to any variation in writing.
Should you choose to instruct us, it would deemed that you have agreed for us to act for you pursuant to these terms of engagement.
Should you have any questions or clarifications on these terms of engagement, please contact us.

Competence and Client Service

In providing regulated services to you, we will always act competently and in a timely manner consistent with the terms of the retainer and the duty to take reasonable care.

Confidential Information

We will protect and to hold in strict confidence all information concerning a client, the retainer, and the client’s business and affairs acquired in the course of the professional relationship.

Client Interests
In acting for you, we will, within the bounds of the law and these rules, protect and promote the interests of the client to the exclusion of the interests of third parties. nt Interests
Independent judgement and advice
We will always exercise our professional judgement within the bounds of the law and our professional obligations, solely for your benefit.

Documents, Records and Information

We will keep a record of important documents which we receive or create on your behalf on the following basis:

1. We may keep a record electronically and destroy originals (except where the existence of an original is legally important such as in the case of wills and deeds).
2. 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.
3. 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.

We will provide to you on request copies or originals (at our option) of all documents to which you are entitled under the Privacy Act 1993 or any other law. We may charge you our reasonable costs for doing this.

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.

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 option. We may, at our option, return documents (either in hard or electronic form) to you rather than retain them. If we choose to do this, we will do so at our expense.

We own copyright in all documents or work we create in the course of performing the Services but grant you a non-exclusive licence to use and copy the documents as you see fit for your own personal or commercial use. However, you may not permit any third party to copy, adapt or use the documents without our written permission.

Use of external records: In providing our services to you, we may rely on information provided to us by third parties (eg government agencies, public registries, witnesses or experts). If the information provided by such sources is inaccurate or incomplete, we do not accept responsibility for any such errors or omissions and will not be liable for any connected damage or loss.

Our fees and disbursements

Our fees structure is primarily based on time we spend on your matter on the hourly rate of $300.00 per hour.

If the engagement letter specifies a fixed fee, we will charge this for the agreed scope of the Services. Work which falls outside that scope will be charged on an hourly rate basis. We will advise you as soon as reasonably practicable if it becomes necessary for us to provide services outside of the agreed scope and, if requested, give you an estimate of the likely amount of the further costs.

We will send you periodic invoices outlining the work undertaken and the sum payable. The sum payable will include our fees and goods and services tax and disbursements (if any). Unless we agree otherwise, all invoices are payable within 14 days for its issuance.

While working on your instructions, should we be required to make any payments to third parties, such as court fees, bailiff charges, etc, you hereby agree to reimburse us all such sums. We will itemise such sums on your invoice for your reference.

If we provide a quote or an estimate of our fees, you accept the same on the condition that it would be based on the information we had at that time and is likely to change as the matter progresses. We will advise you promptly should there be a change in a change.

Carriage of responsibility for your work

Sanjay Kumar, who is the director of our firm will carry the overall responsibility of your work and he may delegate your work with appropriate supervision and responsibility.
Professional indemnity insurance
We do not hold any professional indemnity insurance.

Lawyers’ Fidelity Fund

The New Zealand Law Society maintains the Lawyers’ Fidelity Fund for the purpose of providing clients of lawyers with protection against pecuniary loss arising from theft by lawyers. The maximum amount payable by the Fidelity Fund by way of compensation to individual claimant is limited to $100,000.00. The Fidelity Fund does not cover a client for any loss relating to money that a lawyer is instructed to invest on behalf of the client except in certain circumstances specified in the Lawyers and Conveyancers Act 2006.

Profession Indemnity Insurance

Our firm does not hold professional indemnity insurance.

Our monitoring Obligations

We are obliged to comply with all binding law in all jurisdictions, including (but not limited to):

1. AML/CFT: The Anti-Money Laundering and Countering Financing of Terrorism Act 2009; and
2. FATCA: the USA's Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA), the USA/New Zealand intergovernmental agreement relating to FATCA and related changes to New Zealand legislation.
3. Laws relating to tax and client reporting and withholdings

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.

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 inform.

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 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.

Client care and service information

Whatever legal services your lawyer is providing, he or she must—

1. act competently, in a timely way, and in accordance with instructions received and arrangements made:
2. protect and promote your interests and act for you free from compromising influences or loyalties:
3. discuss with you your objectives and how they should best be achieved:
4. provide you with information about the work to be done, who will do it and the way the services will be provided:
5. charge you a fee that is fair and reasonable and let you know how and when you will be billed:
6. give you clear information and advice:
7. protect your privacy and ensure appropriate confidentiality:
8. treat you fairly, respectfully, and without discrimination:
9. keep you informed about the work being done and advise you when it is completed:
10. let you know how to make a complaint and deal with any complaint promptly and fairly.

The obligations lawyers owe to clients are described in the Rules of conduct and client care for lawyers (the rules). Those obligations are subject to other overriding duties, including duties to the courts and to the justice system.

If you have any questions, please visit www.lawsociety.org.nz or call 0800 261 801.

Complaints

Our firm has a complaints procedure for handling complaints by clients, designed to ensure that a complaint is dealt with promptly and fairly. Should you have a complaint about our services or charges, you may refer that to the director of our firm, Sanjay Kumar.

The New Zealand Law Society also maintains a complaints service and it at the following address: PO Box 5041, Wellington 6145 or email complaints@lawsoceity.org.nz or phone 0800261801