Business Structure Advice - CapitalQ

Business Structure Advice

Business structuring is something most people know is important and needs to be addressed.

And they would all be right.

So let’s do it properly, and get it right from the beginning.

The objectives of our business structure advice are three fold –

  • To provide the very best opportunities, including future flexibility, to minimise tax
  • To create the barriers that assist in your asset protection
  • To provide you with a workable structure, that fits with your industry, your customers and your suppliers, that gives your business credibility, all the while ensuring things are not so complicated you spend all your time dealing with the associated admin.

Sure you can trade as a Sole Trader, but honestly, no real businesses with ambitions of growth and prosperity operate this way. It is more for side ventures, maybe to test the waters or not much more than hobbies. Maybe you would go down this path where you are just contracting (which is arguably the worst situation to be in, you don’t have the rights and benefits of an employee, but you have no control, security and you aren’t creating an asset for your future).

Putting a Sole Tradership aside for all but the very smallest endeavours, we then consider Partnerships, Trusts (in all their forms) and Companies.

We also consider a combination of the above.

A partnership of Trusts, each with Trustee Companies is a popular way to go. It combines all three types of structure, so it is on the complex side. But it comes with a number of significant potential benefits, in particular from a tax minimisation point of view.

In fact, arguably it is one of the very best structures where unrelated parties are coming together and they all want the best possible chance of paying no tax at all when they eventually sell out of their business at a large profit!

But there is most definitely no one size fits all. We even have differing structures for our differing business interests. So tailoring each structure element to your various business and investment interests is paramount in our view, and advice we clearly follow ourselves.

Now you may be thinking “I can just change things later if I need to”.

Well to an extent you would be right in that it is easier to restructure today than it was in the past. But we can assure you –

  • Restructuring an existing business is an administrative nightmare, you do not want to have to do it if you can avoid it
  • Restructuring very often still comes with tax consequences, even with the new tax roll-overs the Federal Government has created in recent times
  • Stamp Duty, a State based tax as opposed to Federal income tax, is still usually payable even when the income tax consequences can be managed
  • Almost without exception there are substantial costs, both known and hidden, to restructuring

So again, we say, let’s get it right up front.

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What our customers say

Logo for Michael Gray
Duncan Melbin’s firm first became the business accountants for Exploration Data Services, and my Family, when he was still a Graduate Accountant some 24 years ago. Myself and my late business partner have followed him ever since!

In the early days Duncan was very proactive in regards to fine tuning our business structure and the benefits of getting the structure right early are still flowing today.

Throughout my time working with Duncan he has played a key role in ensuring our tax affairs have always been in order and our tax obligations have always been minimised and well managed.

Duncan has also played a key role in ensuring my Family and I have adequate wealth protection in place and that we have maximised our wealth creation including through a regular superannuation contribution strategy and the use of a self-managed super fund that keeps us engaged, in control and to a large extent free from the perils of the GFC.

More recently we took the opportunity to outsource our entire back office accounting function to CapitalQ including switching our accounting and invoicing to Xero. I now spend barely any time at all on my monthly accounting and Activity Statement lodgements, as CapitalQ have it all in hand. This allows me to focus on running my business better, and frankly to have more time to enjoy the spoils of a life in business.

I work closely with Kapil Bhasin, our Client Manager, and Peter Melbin, our outsourced Bookkeeper, and they are clearly very valuable assets for CapitalQ.

Working with Duncan, Kapil and Peter is very easy, they respond promptly to any queries I have and most importantly I have complete trust in the advice they give me and that my business affairs are being well looked after. I would recommend CapitalQ to any potential client without reservation.

So if you own a small business or are looking to grow your wealth I highly recommend you speak to the CapitalQ Team. They will give you good advice, and ensure you are on track for a sound business and financial future (and outsourcing your back office accounting process to them, and switching to Xero, will be two of the best business decisions you will make).

Michael Gray

Director - Exploration Data Services (Perth)

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