Entrepreneur Resident Visa

• 2 acceptable photos of your head and shoulders
• your original or a certified copy of your passport or certificate of identity

Acceptable photos

You must have a chest x-ray and a medical examination as proof of your good health.

Getting an x-ray or medical examination

If you, or anyone else included in your application, are aged 17 or older you must provide a police certificate from:

• all the countries you are a citizen of, and
• any other country you have stayed in for 12 months or more over the last 10 years, even if it was not all in the same stay.

How to get a police certificate

Good character for residence visas

You must confirm in the application form that you meet fit and proper person requirements.

To be a fit and proper person, all businesses you have influence over must have complied with all immigration, employment and taxation laws. You must also:

• have never been investigated by the Serious Fraud Office or the New Zealand police for any offence resulting from business dealings
• have no convictions for an offence involving dishonesty
• have never been involved in business fraud or financial impropriety.

You can show us you speak English by either providing:

• an acceptable English language test result
• evidence you have an English-speaking background
• evidence you are a competent user of English for other reasons.

English language test results for entrepreneurs and employees relocating to NZ

English-speaking background

You must provide evidence:

• of your relationship with your partner and dependent children, like a marriage certificate and birth certificates
• that your partner and dependent children meet the identity, character, health and English language requirements for this visa.

Partnership
Dependent children

We’ll check our records for evidence you hold an appropriate work visa.

We may be able to accept another current visa, if you’ve been working in your own business in New Zealand for at least 2 years and both:

• your visa allows self-employment in New Zealand
• you meet all the requirements for an Entrepreneur Work Visa.

Entrepreneur Work Visa

You must provide evidence that shows how long you’ve been running your business in New Zealand, which may include:

• a certificate of incorporation 
• audited financial statements
• GST records
• other tax records
• export documents
• employment agreements
• wage and salary records
• documents showing you’ve purchased or leased the business site
• invoices for business equipment and supplies
• any other documents that demonstrate the operation of the business.

You must provide evidence your business has met or exceeded the goals outlined in your business plan.

Preparing your business plan

Your business must be both:

• trading profitably (or have the potential to become profitable within 12 months)
• making enough money to pay yourself an annual salary that’s at least as much as New Zealand’s full-time minimum wage.

You must provide evidence that your business is contributing to New Zealand’s economic growth in one of the following ways:

• introducing new technology, management or technical skills
• enhancing existing technology, management or technical skills
• introducing new products or services
• enhancing existing products or services
• creating new export markets
• expanding existing export markets
• creating at least 1 full-time job for a New Zealander (or at least 3 full-time jobs, if you’ve been in business for less than 2 years)
• offering new skills, networks, management capability and/or capital that increase an existing business’ financial performance.

For us to consider a product or service ‘new’ it would need to:

• be the only one of its kind in New Zealand
• be not previously available in the New Zealand location you run your business.
• offer a significant enhancement or product line not previously provided by an existing New Zealand business or in the location you run your business.

You must have invested at least as much capital as outlined in your business plan. If you’ve been running your business for less than 2 years, your investment must be no less than NZ $500,000.

We may ask you to provide evidence that the business:

• pays workers no less than the minimum wage or other contracted industry standard
• meets holiday and other leave requirements
• provides a safe workplace
• only employs people who are allowed to work in New Zealand.

If the business is included on the list of non-compliant employers maintained by the Labour Inspectorate then we can’t approve your application.

List of non-compliant employers

If you or anyone included in your residence application, have received any welfare benefits or assistance since you were granted a Work Visa, you won’t be eligible to apply for residence.

When you complete your residence application, we’ll ask for your authority to contact Work and Income to check if you’ve received any welfare benefits or assistance.

Work and Income website

We’ll only consider waiving the minimum capital investment requirement , if both:

• your business is in science, ICT or another high-value export sector
• your business shows a high level of innovation or short-term growth prospects.

For us to consider your business high-value export business, it would need to aim to:

• create 5 or more jobs for New Zealanders
• turnover NZ $500,000 in annual exports.

For us to consider your business has an high level of innovation, you would need show us:

• you’ve discovered new ways to produce more goods or services without increasing the production costs
• your business is likely to succeed because of your innovation.