Registering business name after 25 years?

Someone asked me to find this out for them and any advice would be very much appreciate. Just don't press me for too much on particulars, I'm posting as much as I know!

Let's pretend the business owner is called Charlie Murphy and he is a printer.

This is the sequence of events:

*Charlie sets up business as a sole trader 25 years ago, and calls himself 'Charlie Murphy Printing'

*Charlie opens a business bank account in his local bank, in his own name (account name just reads 'Charlie Murphy', not 'Charlie Murphy Printing')

*It never occurs to Charlie to register the business name, as he isn't setting up a company

*Charlie registers the business for VAT, gets a VAT number, and all is fine with the Revenue, they never ask for a certificate of registered business name

*Business trades happily for 25 years, Revenue are happy with the accounts etc, all is well

*Charlie uses the business name on invoices and customers make out cheques to 'Charlie Murphy Printing', and the bank accepts these for payment into the business account

*Now, 25 years later, the bank is refusing to honour any cheques made out to Charlie Murphy Printing until they see a certificate that the business name has been registered

Registering the business name is not a problem and Charlie is perfectly happy to do this. The form asks how long has he been using the business name and since he's had a VAT number for 25 years he'll be putting down '25 years'. Will it cause any difficulty with the Revenue that the business name wasn't registered until now?

No.

Revenue have nothing to do with business names. And vice versa.

Charlie simply registers business name with Companies Office - see : www.cro.ie

oaklea99 said:

Charlie simply registers business name with Companies Office - see : www.cro.ie

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I just wonder what date he should enter on the form with cro for date for start of business? Date from 25 years ago or the date he fills out the form.

Thanks ubiquitous and oaklea.

I think that's what he's wondering too Megan.

He should tell the truth & nothing else. No sense in exposing oneself to suspicion from the authorities for the sake of a silly lie.

As far as I remember, the form asks for the Date of Adoption of Business Name, not for the date for start of business. I assume the date of adoption would be the day you fill in the form (or close to it).

extopia said:

As far as I remember, the form asks for the Date of Adoption of Business Name, not for the date for start of business. I assume the date of adoption would be the day you fill in the form (or close to it).

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Quote from CRO:
Forms to be completed:
To register a business name, submit one of the following forms, along with the registration fee (€40 for paper filing/€20 for electronic filing), to the CRO within one month of adopting the business name:


Its says within one month of adopting name but the OP says the person is trading under this name for 25 years without registering it. Won't he have a problem with the start date?

Megan said:

Won't he have a problem with the start date?

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Not if he tells the truth.

Failure to register a business name is NOT a crime.

I looked up the Registration of Business Names Act 1963. Section 3 says that:
6.—(1) The particulars required to be furnished under this Act by any person shall be furnished within one month after his adoption of the business name.
6.—(2) If the person has adopted the business name before the commencement of this Act. the particulars shall, if not already furnished under the repealed enactment, be furnished within one month from the commencement of this Act.
6.—(3) This section shall apply, where registration is required in consequence of a change of name, as if for references to the date of adoption of the business name there were substituted references to the date of such change.

It doesn't say that failure to register the name is an offence.

Then section 8 says this:
8.—(1) On receiving a statement under section 4, or a statement under section 7 specifying a change in the business name, the registrar shall send by post or deliver a certificate of the registration thereof to the person registering.
8.—(2) A certificate of registration shall be kept exhibited in a conspicuous position at, in the case of a firm or individual, the principal place of business and, in the case of a body corporate, its registered or principal office in the State and, in every case, in every branch office or place where the business is normally carried on, and if not kept so exhibited, the person registered or, in the case of a firm, every partner in the firm shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding £100.

So am I reading this right? It's an offence not to display a certificate once you have it, but it's not an offence not to get one within the one month time period?

The full text of the act is here: http://www.irishstatutebook.ie/1963/en/act/pub/0030/print.html
There are a load of Business Name Regulations as well but they appear to only deal with the fees to be paid for the various certificates etc.

ETA - I found this article too but from what I can find on the Irish Statute Book website these changes were never implemented? I can't find the this Registration and Display of Business Names Bill 2000 anywhere on the Dáil website. Article is here:

The date on the business name certificate will be the date that the form is registered, so the 'date of adoption' does not appear on the cert.

Date of adoption should be the date he first started trading under that business name, ie, 25 years ago. Although it is a requirement to register a BN within a month, it is not a crime to do so later than that. The bank simply wants to see that the business name is registered now, regardless of when the business commenced.