Setting up a business, but not trading till the new year?

l5lr

Hi,

Been looking into registering as a sole trader, and I'd like to be able to get started on getting a website up and start sourcing products and doing a fair bit of marketing before I actually sell anything.

In order to get my hands on a .ie, I need to register the name with the cro. Is it possible to register the name, get myself the .ie and then start trading come new year without any problems from the likes of revenue?

Was also looking to get a .ie for one of my blogs, was advised to register it as a business name to get the domain. Can I do that for a non-profit blog?

Cheers,

Acoshla

Yes you can register .ie and CRO before you start trading, did it myself, no problems with it.

Euanrolls

The CRO is the "Companies Registration Office", as you are setting up as a sole trader you are not required to register with the CRO as that is for companies, a sole trader only needs to register with the Revenue. The CRO is specifically used to deal with companies and the only reason you would register with them is if you need to file annual returns, which, again, sole traders are not required to do. Contact the revenue and tell give them your PPS number and tell them that you are starting a sole tradership and need to register for certain taxes, which for a sole trader, would, at most, be VAT, PAYE and Income Tax. Do yourself a favour and contact an accountancy firm and ask them for help, they will get it done much faster as the Revenue tend to give them a preference because we KNOW what we're doing and the Revenue know the longer they leave things go for us the more pressure we will put on them.

Sorry for the rant, I'm an accountant, but this is as far as my advice will go. Sorry for repeating myself, your choices are... Contact the revenue directly, they will tell you to go off and do x, y and z OR contact an accountancy firm and ask them for assistance. Keep in mind, the way accountants deal with starting up businesses is generic so it doesn't really matter who you get onto, all that matters is what they charge. A smaller firm would be ideal as they will charge less given that they will have less overheads.

dbran

Euanrolls is not strictly correct.

Although it is true that the CRO does deal with companies it also deals with business names.

If you are setting up a business that has a different name to your own you need to register it with the CRO. if you do not register it with the CRO then you will not be able to open up a bank account with that name.

To register for taxes you need to complete a form TR1. Go and do a search for it on www.revenue.ie.

Hope this helps

dbran

CrowdingUp

If you are a sole trader you can always register for taxes at the end of the year if you find that the business is taking off. Just make sure you have enough "runway" as often marketing is not cheap!
Whatever your startup costs are look at your finances and see if you can double your expenses, make 0 sales and still keep the business running for six months (I prefer 18 months myself). If you can then your good for giving the business a go. If not then your business may run into trouble down the line before you have an opportunity to give it the shot that it deserves.

Also, just because you register something as a business does not mean you are automatically going to be contacted by the revenue. The blog should be fine - as long as it makes no money then you pay no tax.

Best of luck!