NZ took PD Mart to court over 57 non-compliant products and false car-seat safety claims

New Zealand's Commerce Commission has taken PD Mart — a budget retailer renamed from Panda Mart and markets itself online as a 'budget Chinese shopping mall' — to court over allegations it repeatedly sold non-compliant products. The commission alleges PD Mart offered 57 non-compliant products, including children's toys and baby walkers, and misrepresented seven types of children's car seats as complying with an international safety standard when they did not. PD Mart runs two 6,000-square-metre stores, in Auckland's Pakuranga and Belfast, Christchurch, selling 50,000 products at low prices.

The commission said its concerns 'did not arise from a single visit or isolated incident': from October 2024 its staff visited the stores and allegedly found non-compliant goods on multiple visits. In September 2025 it issued a 'stop now' letter over the children's car seats; the notice prompted PD Mart to recall all car seats the commission had identified and offer refunds — the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment said 176 units across seven models were affected.

During the investigation the company also recalled and removed potentially unsafe children's toys, baby rattles, bikes and baby walkers. In 2026 it gave court-enforceable undertakings to withdraw certain non-compliant products from sale and agreed not to sell products in categories where the commission had identified concerns for at least six months.

Alongside the product allegations, the commission alleges PD Mart did not have adequate systems, policies and processes to meet its product-safety obligations, that staff were not adequately trained, and that it misrepresented customers' ability to return products under the Consumer Guarantees Act. Commission general manager Rebecca McAtamney said it was the 'scale and recurring nature' of the issues that made them a serious concern, and that consumers 'shouldn't have to choose between price and safety' when buying products for their family.

Court proceedings by the Commerce Commission; recall of 176 child car seats across seven models; recalls of toys, bikes and walkers; court-enforceable undertakings.

Non-compliant goods were allegedly found on multiple store visits over months, pointing to a systemic sourcing and compliance gap rather than a one-off stocking error.

Car seats were advertised as meeting an international safety standard they had not passed — a false claim about children's safety, not just missing paperwork.

The company allegedly lacked the systems, policies, processes and staff training its obligations required.

It also misrepresented customers' return rights under the Consumer Guarantees Act, compounding the harm when products failed.

A low-price, high-SKU retail model without compliance systems converts scale into safety risk: 50,000 products and no process to check them is how one store visit becomes a court case.

During the investigation PD Mart recalled and removed potentially unsafe products and, after the September 2025 stop-now notice, recalled all identified car seats and offered refunds to affected customers. In 2026 it gave court-enforceable undertakings to withdraw certain non-compliant products and to stay out of the flagged categories for at least six months. The Commerce Commission filed court proceedings over the alleged repeat offending in October 2026; no penalty has yet been determined.