New UK Legislation

[mishmash]

On the Thursday before Christmas a European law, the First Company Law Amendment Directive, was brought into UK Law by the The Companies (Registrar, Languages and Trading Disclosures) Regulations 2006 - http://www.opsi.gov.uk/si/si2006/uksi_20063429_en.pdf

From 1 January 2007, the Companies Act 1985 as amended requires the company's name to appear legibly in:
(a) all its business letters,
(b) all its notices and other official publications,
(c) on all its websites,
(d) all bills of exchange, promissory notes, endorsements, cheques, orders for money or goods purporting to be signed by or on behalf of the company, and
(e) all bills of parcels, invoices, receipts, letters of credit.
In addition, the company's business letters, order forms and websites have to include fuller particulars, i.e.
(a) the company's place of registration and the number with which it is registered,
(b) the address of its registered office,
(c) in the case of an investment company , the fact that it is such a company, and
(d) in the case of a limited company exempt from the obligation to use the word "limited" as part of its name , the fact that it is a limited company.
All these requirements apply whether the document is in hard copy or electronic or any other form.

Source: www.dti.gov.uk/files/file36201.doc


Yet another day stolen from me by the Government as I try and go round all my websites (on which previous legislation did not require the above) and add my company number and registered office to them.

I was not previously hiding my company's identity the required information was easily found via a whois (or even a Google) search.


One problem I have with this new legislation is the word "legibly" . It is not down to me how a client's web-browser or email software renders my company information.
eg. I use X-Organisation email headers - some mail clients give that huge prominence, others don't reveal it until a user opts to "view details" or "view source".

Would including my legally required details in a Flash or Quicktime movie or some other proprietary format make them less legible than their plain text equivalents?

 

[olebean]

There is supposed to be a £1000 if you dont do it.. nobody bothers with it

 

[bb99]

Yeah this raises interesting issues for domain parking. If a Limited company owns a domain name and parks it, is it their website? Or is it the parking company's website that is accessed through the domain owner's domain name?

A grey area

 

[olebean]

As with all grey areas the courts will decide....

 

[bb99]

As with all grey areas the courts will decide....

Unless it's the DRS, in which case Uncle Tony decides

(Sorry, couldn't resist)

 

[olebean]

OMG I have an evil uncle!

 

[Sci7]

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[mishmash]

So do the UK's fast growing and successful companies obey this law?

Well I used the list at fast50.co.uk to try and find out, and while many did I found:

*Digital Window Ltd. Does not currently include the information on its one page website at Digital Window Ltd

site:affiliatewindow.com 04010229 - Google Search

Suggests it's company registration number is not on the affiliatewindow.com website.


*Volantis Systems Ltd.
I couldn't find it's company number and registered office details on Volantis - Intelligent Content Adaptation , again a Google search for it's company registration number appears to back this up:

site:volantis.com 03910006 - Google Search

* S2S Limited UK Limited Company, (Company number: 3952958)
I couldn't find it's company number and registered office details on s2s ltd welcomes you - s2s ltd is a security specialist network integrator and a Cisco Gold Partner in the UK , again a Google search for it's company registration number appears to back this up:

site:s2s.ltd.uk 3952958 - Google Search

*Bigmouthmedia - Search engine optimisation (optimization), Search engine marketing and Internet marketing services - Bigmouthmedia the Full Search Agency - I can't find the required information on that site either

*Pertmaster - details appear only to be on a PDF burried prety deeply within the site: http://www.pertmaster.com/docs/PM_LicenseOrderForm.pdf

*Wavex UK Limited Company, (Company number: 3616561)
I couldn't find it's company number and registered office details on http://www.wavex.co.uk , again a Google search for it's company registration number appears to back this up:

site:wavex.co.uk 3616561 - Google Search


I've left the Irish ones off - as they've got till the 1st of April 2007 to comply because their Government's being a bit slow in implementing the European Law - http://www.odce.ie/GetAttachment.aspx?id=c1443618-281b-4161-b42e-1d0b6d8a3cf5 (I've read one article suggesting the UK was lax in not implementing it until the 1st of Jan 2007.)

I don't know what this means - the law is being ignored and apparently not enforced - making it a very bad law because the government can fine companies at will.

 

[SF]

Good stuff MishMash - good info

 

[Pred]

For fully established sites (which is i hope what they mean) not just one pagers & parked pages.
Is it good enough to have all the detilails on a contact page? & just the limited company name & number at bottom?
hoping so
cheers
Pred
nb: also i'm guessing it is just for ecommerce sites? where people are invited to pay etc. not just reading info, clicking on adsense or even clicking through affiliates

 

[mishmash]

also i'm guessing it is just for ecommerce sites? where people are invited to pay etc. not just reading info, clicking on adsense or even clicking through affiliates

No the new law requires all of a company's websites to carry the information. The previous law - The Electronic Commerce (EC Directive) Regulations 2002 (http://www.opsi.gov.uk/si/si2002/20022013.htm) was not so all encompassing.

For fully established sites (which is i hope what they mean) not just one pagers & parked pages.

No the new law says all a company's websites.

Further the amendment states that any company which causes or authorises the appearance of a website of the company on which the company’s name is not so mentioned will be in breech of the law.

In the case of parking pages and affiliate pages it may not always be clear which company's details ought be cited - a literal reading would be that if one company has the domain registered to it, and another produces and controls the website then both company's are "causing the appearance of the website" - but then if I'm going to take that to a literal extreme I'll need to be citing the details of all companies which are causing the appearance of my websites that'll be:
*The electricity supplier (At the server, all parts of the network en-route from server to client, and at the client)
*The hardware manufacturers of the server, cables, network, client
*Software companies responsible for the server, client and routing software
*The web-hosting company
*Any web design company
etc.

What about companies who've got "websites" that are produced by pieces of hardware such as printers and routers/switches (and rabbits) that are directly connected to the network - even if they just present a login page should they carry the required information?

What about locally broadcast pages available via a only via local (wireless) network? - are they websites? the act doesn't define the term.

What about WAP sites?

Is it good enough to have all the detilails on a contact page? & just the limited company name & number at bottom?
hoping so

I'd say yes - the info. Including place of registration, and address of registered office just has to be legibly on the site somewhere. Imagine you're in court defending your location as legible...