Legal Issues for Setting Up a Business
From Entrepedia: The Entrepreneurship Wiki
When you are setting up a business, it is very important to ensure that you address any legal issues properly. This will mean, amongst other things, determining the appropriate structure for your business, and of course familiarising yourself with any and all legal requirements that relate to your business, i.e. taxation or intellectual property law.
Business Structure
Is your business a partnership? A limited company? Or do you intend to be a sole trader? Each structure involves different legal implications with which you should become familiar.
Accounting Records
It is crucial to sort out your book-keeping from the outset of your business; this may mean researching different systems, or it may be less stressful to look into hiring a book-keeper at a competitive price.
Taxation
No one can escape paying taxes, and it is no different for your business. It is incredibly important to understand taxation issues in order to avoid any confusion or misunderstandings which can be fatal to your business in the future.
Advisers
With all of the important legal concerns involved in starting up a business, it could be a very wise move to consider seeking out some professional legal advice to ensure that you make the best decisions for your business.
Intellectual Property
It is important for any entrepreneur to understand intellectual property law and how it will concern their business or business idea specifically.
Copyrights and Trademarks
Copyright and trademarks - an intellectual property right - are in fact very different things, and therefore it is important to familiarise yourself with both terms and their individual definitions.
Patents
Patent protection is granted to inventions, so understanding patenting will be specifically important if your business involves or is centered around a new invention.
Legal Issues: Website Design
Most businesses will rely on their website to draw in customers and promote their product or service, so it is important to make sure that your website complies with all IPR and design legislation.
On-line Contracts
Many businesses will want to use their sites in order to buy and sell products on‑line. Given this, one key issue is the way in which they will enter into contracts with their customers over the internet. The same requirements for off-line contracts have to be fulfilled in order to ensure that an on-line contract is legally binding.
Website Compliance
Making sure that your website complies with design IPRs and other legislation, there are some questions that you need to ask and changes that you may need to implement.
For links to more information about legal issues, click here
