We recognise that the situation with COVID-19 in New Zealand is constantly changing and evolving.
This is happening too quickly for us to use our standard regulatory tools to vary any of the regimes that we enforce. As a result, we intend to be pragmatic in our approach to enforcement where companies can demonstrate that any compliance issues have arisen as a consequence of prioritising efforts to protect customers, security of supply and safety or as a consequence of factors entirely outside of the company’s control. We would appreciate all regulated industries keeping us informed of any decisions that they make that may lead them to breach their requirements.
COVID-19 is likely to have further impacts on our work programme and once we have greater clarity on what those impacts are and our response to them, we will post updates here.
Regulatory reporting processes
We have eased a range of regulatory reporting processes to relieve pressure on those working with these processes. For more information read our letter on 26 March 2020 relating to Part 4.
Open letter of 26 March 2020, that outlined our intention to ease a range of regulatory reporting processes to relieve pressure on industries regulated under Part 4 of the Commerce Act 1986, while they focus on providing essential services. These have formally been given effect through a number of exemptions and amendments to information disclosure and price-quality regulation. These are set out below.
