Dispute Resolution

If you've got a difficult dispute, we have a track record of producing top outcomes for our clients.

Our skills lie in doing the hard stuff (i.e. highly technical disputes or those with accounting and tax issues) and we have a proven track record of settling disputes in a cost-effective, timely, commercially acceptable manner.

What sets us apart is our approach to resolving disputes, which is designed to properly evaluate your chances of success and get you the most commercially-acceptable outcome.

If you decide to engage us, we will ask you at the outset to provide us with all documentation and information relating to your case. It's really important that we have complete information right at the beginning because it's the only way we can be honest with you about your chances of success.

Because we take the time to really understand your problem at the outset, we will save you money down the track. We believe that, for most commercial disputes, mediation is an alternative that should at least be considered. We have enjoyed significant success at mediation because we are well prepared and we make sure that our clients have realistic expectations.

Although we favour mediation and other alternative dispute resolution (ADR) techniques, we understand that not all disputes can be resolved using ADR and we often take cases to court.

We have acted and appeared in several landmark cases, including:

  • The leading New Zealand case, subsequently to the Personal Property Securities Act 1999, on the role and status of liquidators
  • The leading New Zealand case on whether a shareholder-driven "derivative" proceeding against directors should be allowed to go ahead if the company is in liquidation
  • An important case in the Supreme Court on the circumstances where insolvency set-off is available to a creditor of a company in liquidation
  • A High Court case where we successfully avoided specific performance of a sale and purchase of property agreement being ordered against our client where the purchaser wanted a discount of the purchase price because the property had no code compliance certificate. This judgment has been referred to, with approval, by the Court of Appeal in a recent landmark case

We have also acted and continue to act in:

  • "leaky building" cases, for plaintiffs and for defendants
  • other construction disputes including adjudications under the Construction Contracts Act 2002
  • employment disputes
  • disputes between neighbours, including issues relating to easements and the like
  • copyright infringement and other intellectual property cases
  • relationship property disputes
  • security enforcement and debt recovery proceedings