Christine Liggins New Zealand’s First Accredited Personal Insolvency Practitioner

In April 2020, Debtfix co-founder Christine Liggins became New Zealand’s first accredited insolvency practitioner specialising solely in the field of personal insolvency appointments.

This allows Mrs Liggins to use the insolvency practitioner designation and be listed on a publicly accessible register.

As an accredited insolvency practitioner, Mrs Liggins is recognised as having appropriate experience and is subject to a code of ethics, rules and standards.

She must undertake ongoing competency requirements, reviews and is subject to disciplinary processes should the need arise.

The accreditation regime was established in New Zealand to improve and enhance the ethical standards and professional competency of insolvency practitioners.

This will be further enhanced by the introduction of statutory Insolvency Practitioner Regulations 2019, expected to be introduced in June 2020 but delayed until September 2020 due to Covid-19.

Mrs Liggins is a member of the Restructuring, Insolvency & Turnaround Association of New Zealand (RITANZ) accredited by the Chartered Accountants Association of Australia and New Zealand.

Since 2004, Mrs Liggins has worked with New Zealanders resolving their money issues via a community budget service where she trained as a budget adviser.

As her dedication and experience grew, she began dealing with complex cases and insolvency procedures in 2008.

Now with the social enterprise, Debtfix, Mrs Liggins is a debt repayment order (previously summary instalment order) supervisor, appointed by the Official Assignee, and a trustee of creditors proposals, working with the courts.

She is also a tutor and holds educational seminars and has written various financial literacy programmes.

She works with various bodies in the sector including, the National Building Financial Capability Charitable Trust (FinCap), The Commission for Financial Capability and Te Wānanga o Aotearoa.

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