Every year without fail millions of people make New Year's resolutions, most of which will be broken by 5th January. An easy way to keep a New Year resolution is to make one that will benefit your business.
During the course of the year, commercial solicitors see clients who have many common problems which could quite easily have been avoided if action been taken prior to the difficulty arising.
Here are 13 ideas for resolutions, which may help your business in the forthcoming year – if you action them, of course: -
Ensure all of your staff have proper contracts of employment. Failing to do so is a slam dunk win for an employee at an Employment Tribunal.
Impose credit limits on your customers and stick to them. Remember, if you do not give credit, you will never have a bad debt!
Consider opening an account with a credit reference agency in order to check out potential customers' credit worthiness.
If you do not have terms and conditions of trading, get some drafted (and this does not mean copying your competitors’!). If you do not use your own terms and conditions, you could well find yourself bound by your customers, which could be onerous. If you do have terms and conditions read them and use them properly. Do not become one of those individuals who have terms and conditions yet has no idea what they contain or worse still, no idea what they mean!
Ensure that you understand important contracts. You should not enter into a contract if you do not understand and agree with every provision. Review your contracts and see if they can be improved. Contracts should be reviewed carefully and limit the businesses potential liability.
Make sure obligations of the Company Secretary are understood. It is a role that is more than form filling.
Ensure that your business notepaper and website complies with relevant legislation. If you don’t know whether yours does…the chances are it does not!
Make sure your business is registered with the Information Commissioners Office to process personal data. Failing to do so is an offence.
Properly protect any intellectual property you might have in your business (e.g. copyright, patents, trade/service marks etc). Failure to register trade/service marks or to correctly identify your copyright work could result in your losing valuable business assets.
Ensure that you instruct your solicitor to make a Will on your behalf. If you already have a Will, ensure that it is up to date. Failure to leave a Will that adequately disposes of your business interests can cause tremendous problems, not only for your family but your business partners.
Consider taking out a legal expenses insurance policy to protect against Employment Tribunal litigation.
Visit The Knowledge Hub at www.brethertons.co.uk and download copies of white papers dealing with the duties of a Company Secretary, employment law advice and insurance and infographics explaining the debt recovery process.
If you are a Brethertons client ask us to undertake a free TKW Audit to identify issues in 15 areas which may impact your business in the year ahead.
If our Commercial team can be of any assistance please do not hesitate to get in touch with Suki Thandi on 01788 579 579 or via email on sukithandi@brethertons.co.uk or contact any of our offices: Banbury, Bicester, and Rugby. Alternatively, you can contact us directly on 01295 270999 or visit our website.
Happy New Year from all at Brethertons!
Please treat the contents of our blogs as general guidance only. Please do not take any action based on their contents unless you have sought specific legal advice. Brethertons cannot accept responsibility for any errors or inaccuracies, loss or damage in circumstances where there is no formal retainer between us and we have not given you personal and specific advice relating to a matter for which you have given us full background details. You must also bear in mind that the contents of our blogs are based on English Law, and because they contain archival material, that material is likely to go out of date. Therefore, it is important to consider the date that the blog was posted. Please also remember that the law may differ in different Jurisdictions.