Terms & Conditions - Working Holiday visa

Terms of use

You will be responsible for all activities that are carried out under your account.

Unauthorised access of the Working Holiday Scheme Online Service is not permitted. The Working Holiday Scheme Online Service must not be used for:

  • what is or could reasonably be regarded as improper, injurious, offensive or unlawful purposes
  • in a manner that is likely to interfere with other INZ systems or services
  • in a manner likely to interfere with anyone else's use of the Working Holiday Online Service.

INZ investigates all instances of unauthorised access to the Working Holiday Online Services.

For the avoidance of doubt, the use of automated tools (including the use of scripts, web-crawlers, robots or screen-scrapers) to access, attempt access, or in any way applied to the Working Holiday Online Services is unauthorised.

INZ has measures to identify instances of unauthorised access and reserves the right to take action in relation to any such instances of unauthorised access to the Working Holiday Scheme Online Services.

INZ reserves the right to suspend, restrict or terminate your access to this System at any time without notice at our discretion if we have reasonable grounds to believe you have breached any of the terms of use.

Instances of unlawful access and/or use may also be liable for prosecution.

INZ reserves the right to:

  • modify, suspend or withdraw all or any part of the Working Holiday Scheme Online Service without notice
  • change any of these terms and conditions without notice (any continued use by you of the Working Holiday Scheme Online Service following any changes shall be deemed to be acceptance of the changes).

In any of the above circumstances, INZ will not be liable to you or to any third party for any loss or damage whatsoever.

INZ is constantly looking for new ways to improve this System. We therefore reserve the right to amend these terms at any time. All such changes will take effect once they have been posted on the System and you will be deemed to have accepted any such changes by your use of the System from such time.

About the Working Holiday Online Service

Registering for the Working Holiday Scheme Online Service to see whether you would qualify for a visa under the Working Holiday Scheme and, if you are eligible, will allow you to complete and lodge a Working Holiday Scheme application. If your application is successful you will be approved a visa electronically.

You will also be able to view the status of your Online application.

When submitting a Working Holiday Scheme application, you will need to pay an application fee by credit card (Visa, MasterCard) online.

Each time you use the Working Holiday Scheme Online Service, you will be asked to identify yourself with your User Name and Password. You could lose access to your personal information if you can’t provide the correct User Name. You will also be responsible for any incorrect or unauthorised use of your User Name and Password. So make your User Name and Password easy to remember and keep them confidential. Do not write your password down or give it to any other person. 

The Working Holiday Application

The Working Holiday Scheme application consists of the completion of an online application form, which, if it meets our criteria, can be submitted to Immigration New Zealand. If your application is submitted successfully it will be assessed to see if it meets the criteria for approval. When a decision on your Working Holiday Scheme application has been made, you will be notified by email and asked to check the status of your application by viewing your Working Holiday Scheme homepage. If your application is unsuccessful, you will be advised of the reason that it cannot be approved.

Your Working Holiday Scheme application will be retained by Immigration New Zealand and will be electronically available to Immigration New Zealand Branches and our National Contact Centre.

All steps have been taken to ensure that Immigration instrucitons is adhered to in all respects, and in accordance with Immigration New Zealand Operational Manual, Immigration Act 2009 including subsequent amendments and regulations. Applications submitted will be subject to approval by an Immigration. 

Online Payment Transactions

Payment of your Working Holiday Scheme application fee must be made through the Working Holiday Scheme Online Service using Visa or MasterCard credit cards. All payments are conducted in New Zealand Dollars (NZ$), and Immigration New Zealand accepts no risk or liability where foreign exchange rates may prove unfavourable.

The New Zealand Government charges a goods and services tax (GST) on all goods and services in New Zealand, including Immigration New Zealand applications. This tax is included as part of the standard application fee. Payments are accepted for the processing of the Working Holiday Scheme application,and for the purpose of securing a place under the WHS quota and do not constitute in any way, an approval of an application.

Following payment, an application could be approved or declined in an Immigration New Zealand Branch where an application has been transferred for further processing. Immigration New Zealand is not obliged to provide any form of refund if an application is declined for any reason. A secure system for processing credit card transactions is provided by Westpac Banking Corporation.

Privacy Policy

The information collected is used to determine your eligibility for a Working Holiday Visa.  We may use any information you transmit to us to, among other things, advise you of our products and services to contact you for research purposes or to advise you on immigration matters. This information may also be used to determine your entitlement to board a flight to come to, or return to New Zealand.

Your personal information will not be shared with airline check-in agents, however a boarding message will be returned to the airline check-in agent based on information you have supplied. The main recipient of the information is Immigration New Zealand of the Department of Labour but it may also be shared with other Government agencies which are entitled to this information under applicable legislation, or with other agencies in accordance with an authority stated. The collection of the information is voluntary but if you do not supply it your application may not be able to be accepted.

You have the right to access and correct your personal information held by Immigration New Zealand by writing to your nearest Branch office. Any information that you enter through our website may be retained by Immigration New Zealand and used for immigration regulatory control. 

Security Statement 

Cookies are used to help manage your Working Holiday Scheme Online Services session. You will need to have cookies enabled on your Internet browser to make any application online. The cookies are “non-persistent” and will be destroyed when logging out of Working Holiday Scheme Online Services, or when closing your Internet browser. Cookies are valid for one session only, and will never be saved or written to your hard drive.

The Working Holiday Scheme Online Service uses standard Hyper Text Mark-up Language (HTML). No Dynamic HTML (DHTML), client side components (such as ActiveX or Java Applets), or client side scripting languages (such as JavaScript) are used. All reasonable precaution has been exercised in establishing the Working Holiday Scheme Online Service to prevent unauthorised use or tampering with customer information.

Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) encryption technology provides a secure industry standard to protect your personal information while online. This means that all information transferred between your Internet browser and the Working Holiday Scheme Online Service is strongly encrypted and is secured.

Our Internet site is built to work with Microsoft Internet Explorer version 4.0 and above, and Netscape Navigator version 4.0 and above. If you experience any difficulties in viewing, or interacting within the Working Holiday Scheme Online Service, please check the version of your browser, and upgrade if necessary. If you are using a recent version, and continue experiencing problems, please contact the Webmaster.

No confidential personal information about your application, or any other such personal information that Immigration New Zealand retains, will be transmitted through email to you. If your submitted application is successful, an email will be sent to your registered email address with a link to the Working Holiday Scheme Online Service Log On page where you can access your application status.

Transactions through Paymark (www.paymark.co.nz) using personal credit card details, establish a secure link directly between yourself and the Paymark server. The link with the Internet is then disestablished and a secure link established into the banking system for verification and authorisation of the credit card and the transaction. Transactions are made using industry-leading 128-bit encryption. A transaction will normally be conducted within 10 seconds.

Immigration New Zealand will not retain a record of your credit card details, although these details will be held by Paymark and the banking system as an audit trail of your payment transaction. 

Disclaimer and Liability

The purpose of the information content within the Working Holiday Scheme Online Services site is to assist with your Working Holiday Scheme application only.

Immigration New Zealand has taken all reasonable care to ensure that the information provided during your application process is accurate, and adequate for the purposes of this service. Immigration New Zealand shall not be liable for any loss through the misuse, directly or indirectly, of any information, product or service. You assume all risks associated with use of the website, including the risk of your computer, software or data being damaged by any virus which might be transmitted or activated via the website or your access to it and the risk that the content of this website and linked websites may not comply with the laws of any country outside New Zealand.

Information or materials which are offensive, pornographic, unsuitable for minors' access or otherwise of a criminal or violent nature may be accessible through this site either as a result of hacking or material placed on linked websites. Immigration New Zealand makes no representations as to the suitability of the information accessible for viewing by minors or any other person.