I am considering going into a business partnership / or taking on an employee I have already been in discussions with someone who approached me etc etc

 

My mother (works at tax office lol) advised me against it as she sees alot of cases where partners have doubled crossed the other partner, or where employees who work from home have not paid their NI or tax and it has fallen on business owner.

 

Does any one have experience of this or can offer me any advice?

I feel this person could benefit my business greatly but do not want to get myself into something I can't get out of.

 

Or does any one have experience of forming a business partnership and the legal bits involved?

Thank you

Charlotte

Hi Charlotte

 

Hope you're doing fine. Having business partners can be tricky and it's a sensitive situation. I have friends who entered into a partnership but later ended up in a sour and bitter separations. Most cases it was a conflict between money matters. Your mom is right in a way. About 80% of the partnerships I've known did not end well.

 

Sorry if my opinion might not be favorable to you. Also the length of time you've known your business partner doesn't help too. My friend's partner have been high school buddies and have been business partners for 15 long years and he found out his partner was secretly transferring the earnings to his other "secret" company. They parted ways after that.

 

My boss used to tell me, when someone has worked for you for many years doesn't mean he/she is loyal to your company. I had a client from my freelancing, when I visited his office he had dozens of video cameras in every part of the office, He complained to me about his tenured employees ( those having worked for him for 10+ years) stealing the chocolate products his company sells.

 

Maybe for now the best thing is taking an employee and from there maybe you can foresee and decide your options. Hope this enlightened you in a way.

 

Spencer

Thanks Spencer, yes that does help.

 

Right now I out source some work when I get too busy. Can I not just out source it to him but feature him on my web site still? That way he has to declare his own earnings and I just put it down as an expense?

 

Thanks!

Charlotte

Ive just pulled out of a partnership after my partner who was supposed to be sales for a project "Bulgaria Tourist Information" made me 600 euros in a whole year, and i designed, built and updated the project all year full time, i would say DONT do it, get an employee, partnerships are a waste of time unless your very lucky.

Thanks Spencer, yes that does help.

 

Right now I out source some work when I get too busy. Can I not just out source it to him but feature him on my web site still? That way he has to declare his own earnings and I just put it down as an expense?

 

Thanks!

Charlotte

 

Hi Ms. Charlotte,

 

Yes I think outsourcing is your safest option for now. He can declare his own earnings and you can declare your outsourcing as expenses. You can have some "test" projects with him for now and observe.

 

Had a friend whom I've known for 10+ years and thought of having him as my partner. One time I referred a client to my friend. However, my friend did not deliver the designs on time to this client and this client called me up at 1 am in the morning complaining about the poor service of my friend. I was embarassed and when someone calls you up around 1am is something serious. Confronted my friend and he gave me a negative response.

 

I've learned that in life the years of knowing a person sometimes is not a sure guarantee things will work out well. Though I am not generalizing this is true in all cases. Maybe we'll just have to prudent and prepared.

 

Best of success to your business. Weekend's here and hope you have a fun weekend.

 

spencer

I kind of disagree. the question is too general as it depends on your personalities and how truly honest you are. What I mean is you will always have disagreements but if you are the type of people who can discuss things through and come to a logical conclusion then you will find having a business partner of great benefit. It's like any relationship it needs work. I have a business partner and we have had disagreements in the past but 9 times out of 10 we will always discuss things through and come out stronger. It also depends on each of your strengths and recognising the importance of the other aspects of business that will need your full attention like accounting and paying invoices. Hope it helps.

Because of the problems I stated above I have been discussing this topic a lot, most peoples responses were negative to having partners, so i hope that can be useful info for you, its seems generally people I spoke to all had problems in a partnership, of course some like the poster above have worked out fine put my inquires found most peoples partnerships finished badly.

 

Tobes

I think we are going to work on the out sourcing path and he will input into my web site and merge our portfolio and gain customers together but Smooth-Online will still belong to me.

 

The main weariness was because I'd heard of partners not paying tax / NI and it fell onto the other owner to pay it.

 

Charlotte

Outsourcing is easier.