Key points

1. Introduction

These Terms of Use (“Terms”) govern your access to and use of the Freewills website and service at app.freewills.co.nz (“Service”), operated by Ezi Systems Ltd, a New Zealand entity with its registered office in Christchurch, New Zealand (“Freewills”, “we”, “us”, or “our”).

By creating an account, expressly accepting these Terms, generating a document, or otherwise using the Service, you agree to be bound by these Terms and acknowledge our Privacy Notice.

If you do not agree to these Terms, you must not use the Service.

We may update these Terms from time to time. The current version will be made available through the Service. We will give reasonable notice of material changes where appropriate, including through the Service or by email.

Changes will apply from the date stated in the updated Terms. Your continued use of the Service after that date constitutes acceptance of the updated Terms where permitted by law.

2. What the Service is

The Service is a self-service information and document-generation tool that:

• guides you through a questionnaire about your circumstances;
• uses the answers you provide to generate a draft will document;
• provides general signing and witnessing instructions; and
• optionally stores encrypted answers and generated versions within an account you create.

The Service is not a law firm.

Freewills does not provide legal advice, personalised legal opinions, legal representation, estate-planning advice, succession-planning advice, tax advice, financial advice, accounting advice, or advice about the legal consequences of your individual circumstances.

Using the Service does not create a lawyer-client relationship between you and Freewills or between you and any lawyer.

Nothing in these Terms creates any agency, partnership, joint venture, employment or fiduciary relationship between you and Freewills.

A document generated by the Service is a draft document. Its generation does not mean that it has been legally executed or that it will necessarily be legally effective.

The Service does not receive, store or hold your signed original will and does not verify that a generated document has been printed, signed, witnessed, retained or made legally effective.

3. Eligibility, capacity and suitability

Age

The Service is available only to people aged 18 years or over.

New Zealand law permits some people under 18 to make wills in limited circumstances. The Service is not designed for and does not support those circumstances.

If you are under 18, you must not use the Service to generate a will.

Personal use

You must use the Service to create your own will.

You must not use the Service to create or alter a will on behalf of another person.

The Service does not support court-authorised wills or other arrangements under which somebody seeks to create or alter a will for another person.

Capacity, freedom and undue influence

You must answer the questionnaire yourself and make your own decisions about the contents of your will.

You must confirm that you are making your will freely and voluntarily and that you believe you have the capacity to understand what you are doing.

Freewills does not assess, diagnose, determine or guarantee testamentary capacity and cannot determine whether you are being pressured, coerced or subjected to undue influence.

If you are being pressured to make or change a will, have concerns about your ability to understand the decisions involved, or believe somebody else is attempting to control your decisions, you should stop using the Service and obtain independent legal advice.

Straightforward circumstances only

The Service is designed primarily for people with relatively straightforward personal, family and financial circumstances connected to New Zealand.

It may not be appropriate where circumstances include, for example:

• significant or complex estates;
• family trusts or other trust interests;
• business ownership or substantial business interests;
• overseas property, overseas assets or substantial overseas connections;
• Māori land or succession interests;
• blended or otherwise complex family structures;
• disputes or likely disputes between family members;
• relationship property issues or agreements;
• intended exclusion of a spouse, partner, child or other person who may have legal rights against the estate;
• significant lifetime promises concerning inheritance;
• unusual ownership structures;
• uncertain ownership of assets;
• complex charitable gifts;
• questions concerning adopted children, stepchildren, whāngai, foster children, assisted reproduction or other family relationships with potentially different legal consequences;
• concerns about testamentary capacity, coercion or undue influence; or
• circumstances where another person may have a substantial claim against your estate.

The Service may display warnings, recommend legal advice, restrict particular options, or prevent generation where information you provide indicates that your circumstances may fall outside the intended scope of the Service.

However, the absence of a warning does not mean that your circumstances are straightforward, that the Service is suitable for you, or that you do not need legal advice.

If you are unsure, obtain advice from a qualified New Zealand wills and estates lawyer before signing your will.

4. Accounts and security

You may be required to create an account with a verified email address in order to save questionnaire answers or generated versions.

You agree to:

• provide accurate account information;
• keep your login credentials secure;
• take reasonable steps to prevent unauthorised access to your account; and
• notify us promptly if you believe your account has been accessed without your permission.

You are responsible for activity occurring through your account to the extent permitted by law.

We may suspend, restrict or close accounts that:

• breach these Terms;
• appear to have been compromised;
• are being used unlawfully or abusively; or
• create a security risk to the Service or other users.

5. The will-making process

The Service generates documents from the information and selections you provide.

You are responsible for checking your answers before generating a document and for reviewing the completed document before signing it.

If you are signed in, questionnaire information may be encrypted and stored in accordance with our Privacy Notice.

Each deliberate generation may create a version associated with a document identifier (“Doc ID”) and template version.

A Doc ID records that Freewills generated a particular draft document.

Freewills may also create verification and audit records associated with document generation and other significant Service events. These records may include relevant questionnaire, document-template, signing-instruction, Terms, Privacy Notice and notification-template version information, timestamps, cryptographic fingerprints and tamper-evident audit information.

These records are intended to help establish what the Service generated, displayed or processed at a particular point in time. They do not prove that a generated document was printed, signed, correctly witnessed, retained, remained the person’s latest will, or was legally valid.

A Doc ID does not prove that:

• the document was downloaded or printed;
• the document was reviewed by the user;
• the document was signed;
• the document was correctly witnessed;
• the person signing had testamentary capacity;
• the person signed freely and without undue influence;
• the signed original was retained;
• the document remains the person’s most recent will; or
• the document is legally valid or effective.

Signing a new will may revoke an earlier will or codicil.

You should therefore carefully check that a new will contains everything you intend before signing it.

Marriage, civil union, separation, relationship changes, the birth or adoption of children, deaths, significant changes in assets and other life events can affect your estate planning or whether an existing will operates as expected.

You should review your will following significant changes in your personal, family or financial circumstances.

6. Important legal and estate limitations

No guarantee of legal outcome

The Service provides general information and document-generation tools only.

Freewills does not guarantee that:

• a generated document is appropriate for all of your circumstances;
• all relevant legal issues have been identified;
• information entered by you is accurate or complete;
• your assets will pass in the manner you expect;
• a court will interpret the document in the way you intend;
• a person will not challenge your estate;
• your intended beneficiaries will receive the amount you expect; or
• a generated document will ultimately be legally effective.

Claims against an estate

A will does not necessarily prevent claims from being made against an estate.

Rights and claims may arise under New Zealand law, including under the:

• Family Protection Act 1955;
• Property (Relationships) Act 1976;
• Law Reform (Testamentary Promises) Act 1949; and
• other applicable legislation or legal principles.

Leaving a spouse, partner, child or another potentially eligible person out of your will, or leaving them less than they may expect, does not necessarily prevent that person from bringing a claim against your estate.

If you intend to exclude or make materially reduced provision for a spouse, partner, child or another person who could potentially have a claim against your estate, you should obtain individual legal advice before signing your will.

Relationship and family status

Family relationships can have different legal consequences depending on the circumstances.

Terms such as spouse, partner, child, adopted child, stepchild, whāngai, foster child and other family relationships should not be assumed to have identical legal consequences.

If your family relationships are unusual, uncertain, disputed or complex, obtain individual legal advice before relying on a generated will.

Property not necessarily controlled by your will

A will may not control every asset associated with you at the time of your death.

For example, property held jointly with another person may in some circumstances pass automatically to the surviving owner rather than under your will.

Trust property and assets governed by other ownership or contractual arrangements may also fall outside your estate or operate differently from assets owned solely by you.

Relationship property rights can also affect what property ultimately forms part of an estate or is available for distribution.

You are responsible for understanding how your significant assets are legally owned.

If you are unsure whether an asset can be dealt with under your will, obtain legal advice.

Charitable and organisational gifts

If you leave a gift to a charity, incorporated society, trust, club or other organisation, you are responsible for identifying the intended recipient accurately.

Where possible, you should provide the full legal name of the organisation and any relevant registration or identifying information requested by the Service.

Freewills does not guarantee or independently verify:

• the legal identity of an organisation;
• its registration status;
• whether it continues to exist;
• whether information supplied by you is sufficient to identify it; or
• whether a proposed gift will ultimately take effect as intended.

If a charitable or organisational gift is substantial or the identity of the recipient is uncertain, obtain legal advice.

7. Applicable New Zealand law

You are responsible for correctly signing and witnessing your will in accordance with the Wills Act 2007, other applicable New Zealand law, and the signing instructions provided with the generated document.

A range of other New Zealand laws may affect your will, your estate, particular assets, claims against your estate, or the operation of the Freewills Service. Relevant legislation may include the laws listed below.

These links are provided for general reference only. The list is not exhaustive, legislation may change, and Freewills does not provide legal advice or guarantee that any particular legislation does or does not apply to your circumstances.

Making and executing a will

• Wills Act 2007

Estate, family and inheritance issues

• Family Protection Act 1955
• Property (Relationships) Act 1976
• Law Reform (Testamentary Promises) Act 1949
• Administration Act 1969
• Te Ture Whenua Māori Act 1993 (where Māori land or succession interests are relevant)
• Trusts Act 2019 (where trusts are relevant)
• Charities Act 2005 (where charitable organisations are relevant)

8. Your responsibilities

You are responsible for:

• providing true, complete, accurate and current information;
• answering questions based on your actual circumstances;
• correcting errors before generating your document;
• reviewing the entire generated document before signing;
• checking names, addresses, relationships, percentages, gifts, executors, guardians, substitute beneficiaries and other important details;
• understanding what assets you own and how they are legally held;
• making sure the document reflects your intentions;
• following all signing and witnessing instructions;
• keeping the signed original safe;
• telling your executors or another appropriate person where the signed original can be located;
• reviewing your will when your circumstances change; and
• obtaining professional advice where your circumstances fall outside the intended scope of the Service.

Information supplied by you

The Service relies on the answers and information you provide.

Freewills cannot independently determine whether information you provide is correct, complete, current, misleading, ambiguous or inconsistent with your actual circumstances.

To the maximum extent permitted by law, Freewills is not responsible for an error, omission, unintended result or ineffective provision to the extent it results from inaccurate, incomplete, ambiguous, misleading or outdated information supplied by you.

Signing and witnessing

You are responsible for correctly executing your will in accordance with New Zealand law and the signing instructions provided with the generated document.

Freewills does not observe, supervise or verify the signing or witnessing process.

Freewills does not confirm:

• who signed a document;
• whether signatures are genuine;
• whether witnesses were present as legally required;
• whether appropriate witnesses were used;
• whether a witness was also a beneficiary or otherwise connected to a gift;
• whether the correct document version was signed; or
• whether any later alteration affects the document.

A gift to a person who witnesses a will, or to certain people connected with a witness, may be affected under New Zealand law.

You should follow the witness instructions supplied with the document carefully and obtain legal advice if you are unsure.

Writing on, manually altering or adding wording to a signed will can create serious uncertainty.

If you want to change your will, use the Service to create a new version or obtain legal advice, and complete the required signing and witnessing process again.

Sensitive information

Do not enter passwords, PINs, authentication codes, recovery phrases, private cryptographic keys, complete bank account credentials or other security secrets into free-text notes, wishes, messages or other fields within the Service.

9. What the Service does not do

Unless we expressly state otherwise, the Service does not:

• accept or store signed original wills;
• accept or store scans of signed wills;
• act as custodian of your will;
• verify your identity for testamentary purposes;
• verify the identity of executors, beneficiaries, guardians, witnesses or other people;
• verify ownership, value or legal status of assets;
• verify charity or organisational details;
• verify death;
• verify executor authority;
• apply for probate;
• administer estates;
• supervise signing or witnessing;
• assess testamentary capacity;
• assess undue influence or coercion;
• guarantee legal validity;
• provide executors with access to your will content;
• provide a public search for whether a person created a will; or
• guarantee that a generated document remains appropriate after your circumstances or the law change.

10. Intellectual property and use of generated documents

The Service, including its software, questionnaire structure, templates, wording, document layouts and other content, is owned by or licensed to Freewills and may be protected by applicable intellectual property law.

We grant you a personal, non-exclusive, non-transferable licence to use the Service and documents generated through your account for your own personal will-making and estate-planning purposes.

You may download, print, sign, store and provide copies of your own generated documents to people involved in your personal affairs.

Except where permitted by law or with our written permission, you must not:

• reproduce or redistribute the Service or its templates as a competing product;
• resell access to the Service;
• commercially exploit our questionnaire or template system;
• systematically extract our templates or content;
• misrepresent our materials as your own service; or
• use the Service to provide a competing will-generation service.

11. Privacy and personal information

We handle personal information in accordance with our Privacy Notice and applicable New Zealand privacy law, including the Privacy Act 2020.

Our Privacy Notice explains matters including:

• what personal information we collect;
• why we collect it;
• how it is used;
• how it is stored and protected;
• who it may be disclosed to;
• whether relevant service providers are located outside New Zealand;
• how long information is retained;
• backup retention;
• access and correction rights;
• account deletion;
• privacy complaints; and
• how to contact our privacy officer.

Information about other people

When creating a will, you may provide personal information about other people, including executors, substitute executors, beneficiaries, guardians, family members and other individuals.

You should provide only information that is reasonably necessary for the purpose for which the Service requests it.

Where Freewills collects personal information about another individual indirectly through you, Freewills will handle that information in accordance with the Privacy Act 2020, including applicable notification requirements under Information Privacy Principle 3A, subject to any exceptions permitted by law.

The Privacy Notice provides further information about how third-party personal information is handled.

You must not use the Service to collect, upload or provide information about another person for an unlawful, abusive, harassing or unrelated purpose.

Executor and other notices

If the Service allows you to enable an executor or other notification feature, you are responsible for ensuring the contact details you provide are accurate.

Where enabled by you, Freewills may use those contact details to send the limited notices described by the Service and Privacy Notice.

Enabling a notice does not give the recipient access to the contents of your will unless the Service expressly states otherwise and you separately authorise such access.

Export and deletion

Where available, you may export your account information and delete your account through the Service.

Deleting your account removes active saved account data and substantive saved will information in accordance with the deletion process described in the Privacy Notice.

Encrypted backups may remain for a limited retention period described in the Privacy Notice before being deleted or overwritten through normal backup processes.

Account deletion does not necessarily remove every verification, security or audit record associated with use of the Service. To the extent permitted by law, Freewills may retain a minimal verification record where reasonably necessary to verify document generation or significant system events, maintain the integrity and security of the Service, investigate misuse, respond to disputes, establish or defend legal claims, or demonstrate compliance.

Any such post-deletion record is intended to be limited to information reasonably required for those purposes and may include a Doc ID, timestamps, relevant version information, cryptographic fingerprints and tamper-evident audit metadata. It is not intended to retain the substantive contents of your questionnaire or generated will merely because those contents may be useful in the future.

The Privacy Notice explains this retention in more detail, including how long information may be kept and the safeguards that apply.

12. Acceptable use

You must not use the Service to:

• create or attempt to create a will for another person;
• impersonate another person;
• provide deliberately false or fraudulent information;
• gain unauthorised access to another person’s account;
• send unlawful, misleading, threatening, abusive or unsolicited communications;
• interfere with the security or operation of the Service;
• introduce malicious code;
• scrape or systematically extract the Service or its content for unauthorised commercial purposes;
• attempt to bypass technical or access controls;
• use generated documents fraudulently;
• use the Service to facilitate coercion, undue influence, financial abuse or other unlawful conduct; or
• use the Service in breach of New Zealand law.

13. Fees

The Service is currently provided free of charge.

The fact that the Service is free does not exclude any rights or obligations that apply under New Zealand law.

We may introduce paid services, optional paid features or different service levels in the future.

If we introduce fees, we will provide applicable pricing and any additional payment terms before you agree to purchase the relevant paid service.

We will not retrospectively charge you for a service that was expressly offered to you as free at the time you used it.

You may stop using the Service and delete your account at any time, subject to the data-retention provisions described in our Privacy Notice.

14. Availability, updates and changes

We aim to keep the Service reasonably available but do not guarantee uninterrupted or error-free availability.

The Service may occasionally be unavailable because of:

• maintenance;
• technical problems;
• security incidents;
• third-party service failures;
• internet or infrastructure outages; or
• events beyond our reasonable control.

We may change, update, replace, restrict or discontinue features, questionnaire questions, signing instructions or document templates.

Generated documents may record a template version or other version information so that Freewills can identify which version of the system generated them.

Changes to a template do not automatically update a document you previously downloaded or signed.

You are responsible for reviewing your will periodically and after material changes in your circumstances.

15. Termination and suspension

You may stop using the Service and delete your account at any time.

We may suspend or terminate access where reasonably necessary because:

• you materially breach these Terms;
• your account appears compromised;
• the Service is being used unlawfully or abusively;
• continued access creates a security or operational risk;
• we are legally required to do so; or
• the Service or relevant part of it is discontinued.

Where reasonably practical, we will provide notice before termination unless immediate action is required for legal, security or safety reasons.

Following account deletion or termination, personal information will be handled in accordance with our Privacy Notice, including applicable backup-retention periods.

Deletion or termination does not require Freewills to destroy a minimal verification, security or audit record that we may lawfully retain for the purposes described in these Terms and our Privacy Notice.

16. Third-party services and links

The Service may contain links to or integrate with third-party websites or services, including government resources, charity registers, email providers, hosting providers or other external services.

A link or integration does not mean Freewills endorses or controls the third-party service.

We are not responsible for the availability, content, accuracy, security, terms or privacy practices of third-party services that we do not control.

Your use of a third-party service may be subject to separate terms and privacy policies.

17. Disclaimers and limitation of liability

Non-excludable rights

Nothing in these Terms excludes, restricts or limits any guarantee, right, remedy or liability that cannot lawfully be excluded, restricted or limited.

This includes any rights or remedies you may have under the Consumer Guarantees Act 1993, Fair Trading Act 1986, Privacy Act 2020 or other applicable New Zealand law where those rights or remedies apply.

Service provided as available

Subject to any rights that cannot lawfully be excluded, the Service is provided on an “as is” and “as available” basis.

To the maximum extent permitted by law, we do not warrant that:

• the Service will always be available;
• the Service will be free from errors or defects;
• every possible legal issue will be detected;
• every questionnaire option will be appropriate for every person;
• information provided through the Service will remain current after laws or circumstances change; or
• any generated document will necessarily achieve the outcome you intend.

Excluded losses

To the maximum extent permitted by law, Freewills is not liable for indirect, incidental, special or consequential loss arising from use of the Service.

To the maximum extent permitted by law, Freewills is also not liable for loss arising to the extent caused by:

• inaccurate, incomplete, ambiguous or outdated information supplied by you;
• failure to review a generated document;
• failure to follow signing or witnessing instructions;
• signing the wrong or an outdated version;
• manual alteration of a signed document;
• failure to retain or locate the signed original;
• subsequent changes in your circumstances;
• use of the Service outside its stated intended scope; or
• use of the Service contrary to a warning or recommendation to obtain professional advice.

Liability cap

Subject always to any liability or remedy that cannot lawfully be excluded or limited, Freewills’ aggregate liability to you for claims arising out of or in connection with the Service or these Terms is limited to NZ$100.

The application and enforceability of this limitation remains subject to New Zealand law.

Serious legal document

A will can have significant consequences for you, your family and your estate.

Where you are uncertain about your circumstances or the legal effect of a generated document, we strongly recommend having it reviewed by a qualified New Zealand wills and estates lawyer before signing it.

18. Indemnity

To the extent permitted by law, you agree to indemnify Freewills against third-party claims, losses and reasonable costs resulting directly from:

• your intentional unlawful use of the Service;
• your fraudulent use of a generated document;
• your deliberate misuse of another person’s information;
• your unauthorised commercial exploitation of the Service; or
• your material breach of these Terms that causes loss to a third party.

This indemnity does not apply to the extent a claim or loss was caused by Freewills or where imposing the indemnity would be prohibited by law.

19. Complaints, concerns and disputes

If you have a complaint or concern regarding the Service, including:

• a privacy request or complaint;
• suspected unauthorised account access;
• suspected coercion or undue influence;
• duplicate accounts;
• executor-related communications;
• incorrect information associated with an account; or
• another issue concerning use of the Service,

contact us through the support page.

We will consider complaints and respond within a reasonable period having regard to the circumstances.

Privacy complaints may also be dealt with in accordance with the Privacy Notice and rights available under New Zealand privacy law.

These Terms are governed by the laws of New Zealand.

The courts of New Zealand have jurisdiction in relation to disputes arising from these Terms or the Service, subject to any mandatory rights, jurisdiction or remedies available under applicable law.

20. Contact

Freewills

Ezi Systems Ltd

Christchurch, New Zealand

Support: support page

Privacy officer: Web Manager — support page

21. General

Entire agreement

These Terms, together with the Privacy Notice and any additional terms expressly applying to a particular feature, form the agreement between you and Freewills concerning your use of the Service.

Severability

If any provision of these Terms is found to be invalid or unenforceable, that provision will be interpreted or severed to the minimum extent necessary and the remaining provisions will continue in effect.

No waiver

If we do not immediately exercise a right under these Terms, that does not mean we waive that right.

Assignment

You may not transfer your account or your rights under these Terms to another person without our consent.

We may transfer our rights or obligations as part of a genuine sale, restructuring or transfer of the Service, subject to applicable law and our privacy obligations.

Headings

Section headings are included for convenience and do not limit the meaning of these Terms.

22. Definitions

For these Terms:

Account means a user account created to access or save information within the Service.

Doc ID means a document identifier associated with a generated version. It records generation only and does not prove execution or legal validity.

Draft means a document generated by the Service. A generated document is not treated by Freewills as a verified legally executed will.

Generated document means a document produced by the Service using information and selections supplied through the questionnaire.

Privacy Notice means the notice describing how Freewills collects, uses, stores, protects, discloses and deletes personal information.

Service means the Freewills website, questionnaire, document-generation functionality, account features, notices and related functionality made available by Freewills.

You means the individual using the Service to prepare their own will.

Verification record means a limited record retained for document-generation verification, system integrity, security, dispute-resolution, legal-claim or compliance purposes. It may include a Doc ID, timestamps, version information, cryptographic fingerprints and tamper-evident audit metadata, but is not intended to contain the substantive contents of a deleted questionnaire or generated will.