When buying or selling businesses in New Zealand there are a host of legal liabilities that must be considered, and having these issues sorted out before you make any big decisions is always recommended. Businesses have a number of different rules and standards that they must comply with in the business world. These rules and standards can affect businesses in different ways, depending on their size, number of employees, consumer products and operational facilities. Those who own or manage businesses or have businesses for sale in New Zealand have to make sure their company meets these compliance issues so that they can stay in business or successfully pass it on to a new owner. The website that the Ministry of Economic Development provides for New Zealanders has a very helpful amount of information that you can peruse in order to ensure you are complying with business law. The website provided by Standards New Zealand also has a large amount of information about the requirements your business needs to be aware of.

Naturally the three biggest compliance issues find their roots in financial, government and contract areas. Your company needs to meet the terms of the national accounting standards of New Zealand when you document and report your financial transactions. Publicly held companies are required to go through rather strict regulations when making financial investment judgements because of the part that shareholders and other business stakeholders have in the company. Commonly accepted accounting principles are the main financial standards that companies must comply with. As well as this, businesses in general or businesses for sale in New Zealand might need to go through external audits to verify that the financial information is accurate and valid as shown.

The central government and local district government organisations are able to enforce rules and regulations that businesses have to follow when functioning in the business environment. Some of these issues relate to taxes, product standards, human resource policies and retirement benefits including many more. Business owners or managers will spend large proportions of time going over the government compliance issues that affect their company specifically to make sure they will not garner penalties or fines for noncompliance. Government penalties are usually quite harsh and can limit a company from carrying on operations until the company finishes the resolution process.

Contract compliance includes the professional relationship between two or more companies. Business owners and managers involve themselves in these relationships to achieve the goals and objectives of their business. Compliance issues can come up when one party in the contract does not complete tasks or activities according to the prearranged standards. Much the same as financial compliance issues, companies might experience audits to make sure all groups involved in the contract are performing in the appropriate manner and are steering clear of issues that might develop into dangerous legal situations.

Major legislation relating to businesses in New Zealand includes the Consumer Protection Act 1987, the Commerce Act 1986, the Business Law Reform Bill 2003, the Employment Relations Act 2000 and the Electronic Transactions Act 2002 along with a host of others. These pieces of legislation require constant compliance reporting and vigilant monitoring of your business’ status will prevent any legal problems from arising.