Legal information required on a website - The Book-keepers Forum (UK)

Stuartbham · Senior Member

Legal information required on a website

RossDunn · Veteran Member

Stuart,

I have just found this information on the companies House Website.

Link: http://www.companieshouse.gov.uk/promotional/busStationery.shtml

Business stationery / Translations

Changes to business stationery rules
As from 1st January 2007 the following applies to

Business Stationery

Whether in hard copy, electronic or any other form:
A company must state its name, in legible lettering, on the following -

all the company's business letters, order forms;
all its notices and other official publications;
all bills of exchange, promissory notes, endorsements, cheques and orders for money or goods purporting to be signed by, or on behalf of, the company;
all its bills of parcels, invoices, receipts and letters of credit
on all its websites

On all of its business letters, order forms or any of the companys web sites, the company must show in legible lettering

its place of registration
registered number
its registered office address
and if it is being wound up, that fact,

Whenever an email is used where its paper equivalent would be caught by the stationery requirements then that email is also subject to the requirements. The above also applies to Limited Liability Partnerships.

Hope this explains.

Ross

Quentin Pain · Senior Member

I want to add one thing to Ross's detailed list: You only need to add a single 'About Us' (or 'Contact Us') page for company details to a website (you don't need it on every page, and if you did, it would make the site pretty ugly - take a look at any major companies website to see what they do - you may also be surprised to find how difficult some major companies make it to find that information!).

Make sure that the link to the 'About Us' page is on the main website navigation, so it is always just 1 click away. Companies with registered trademarks often add that to the footer of every page, but that is to ward off potential copyright infringements.

Here's an SEO tip for 'About Us' pages. If you want that page to be found by search engines AND be relevant to your business, then title it 'About My Business' (where 'My Business' means your business name: eg. 'About Essex Bookkeepers'). That way people searching for Essex Bookkeepers may well land precisely on that page.

I am putting together a new site devoted to helping business owners get to page 1 of Google with relevant terms. Feel free to contact me if you are interested in getting news when that is ready.

Stuartbham · Senior Member

Thanks Ross & Quentin. Much appreciated!

Stuart