Confirm the address before you send anyone to the door

Instructions arrive with an address that came from a contract signed two years ago, a client’s account record, or a court file. None of those are current by default. The server carries the cost of finding out: travel, time, a second attempt at a different hour, then a third, and eventually a conversation with the instructing party about whether the address was ever right. The work is the same whether or not anyone is behind the door.

Checking first changes the economics. A trace that draws on directory data, credit file address records, property and title records and company filings will usually either corroborate the instructed address or produce a better one before anyone drives anywhere. Where the subject has moved, the sequence of recorded addresses shows when and in what direction, which matters when you are deciding whether to attempt an address at all.

Digital footprint tracing adds the contact layer that registers do not hold. A phone number, a username or an email address can be resolved to linked accounts and platform registrations drawn from publicly visible information, which is often what converts a stale file into a current contact point. Where the party is a company, the registered office and the address for service come back from the same enquiry, so a corporate defendant does not need a separate search.

The core search is an address history search, supported by digital footprint tracing where a phone number, email or username is available. For a corporate defendant, a company and director search returns the registered office and address for service directly from the Companies Office record. Where ownership of the property in question is relevant, a property title search against LINZ data confirms who is registered against the title.

An address search is bound by the same collection and use limits as any other search under the Privacy Act 2020. It returns recorded positions, not confirmation of current occupancy, and a server still has to exercise their own judgement, and comply with the rules of court that govern personal service, before relying on any address produced by it.

1. Take the instruction and note the address supplied and its likely age.
2. Run an address history search to see whether the instructed address is corroborated or superseded.
3. Where the party is a company, run a company and director search for the registered office and address for service.
4. Where the subject has no strong address match, add digital footprint tracing from any phone number or email supplied.
5. Attempt service at the best-supported address, recording the attempt.
6. If service fails, use the search record as part of the evidence supporting a substituted-service application.

A server is instructed to serve a company at its address on a supply contract from eighteen months ago. A company search shows the company is still registered but the registered office has changed. The server attempts service at the current registered office rather than the contract address, avoiding a wasted trip. Where the director is also named personally, an address history search on the director returns a residential address corroborated by two sources, and that attempt is scheduled separately. No client names or matter details are recorded here.

The value of a search record to a process server is not only the address. When service fails and the instructing solicitor turns to substituted service, the affidavit has to describe what was done to locate the party. A list of licensed sources queried, with the date each source last recorded the information, is a stronger account of reasonable enquiry than a recollection of two visits and a phone call.

Every intelID search requires the user to declare the authorised purpose before results are returned. The declaration is written into the audit log with the user, the timestamp, the subject and the sources queried, and it cannot be edited afterwards by the person who created it. Serving documents under instruction from a client or the court is a declarable purpose; curiosity, a personal matter, or a search on behalf of someone who has not instructed you is not.

Reports are for your own internal business purposes and the purpose declared when the search was run. They may be disclosed to your client, or to a court, tribunal or regulator, in connection with the matter the search was run for. Wider distribution needs our prior written consent, and that limit is set out in clause 7.1 of our terms and conditions.

Subject data is not used for marketing, is not resold, and is not exposed to public indexing. How a trace runs end to end is on the skip tracing page, the workflow on the platform page, every integrated source and its legal basis on the data sources page, hosting and encryption on the security page, and the statutory position on the compliance page. Pricing is a monthly subscription plus a per-search fee, published on the pricing page. An agent working intermittently is not carrying a seat cost that does not match the volume.

Address history searches, digital footprint tracing, company and director searches and property title searches.

Serving documents in New Zealand: address verification and how to find a current address in New Zealand.