Does your company or close corporation trade under names which are different to their registered name?
The Consumer Protection Act which is likely to come into effect in October 2010 will outlaw this.
"Section 79 of the Act prohibits any person from carrying on business except under the person’s full name as recorded in an identity document or officially recognised or in the case of a juristic person (for example, a company), a business name registered with the Registrar of Companies." a
This means that you can no longer buy a shelf company ABC 1043 CC and trade as "Sunrise Cafe". You will need to register the business name "Sunrise Cafe" with CIPRO. If you carry on business using a trade name that is not registered, the National Consumer Commission may require you to cease trading under that name.
Given the current state of CIPRO and its inability to process changes, you should be actioning your name registrations now!
The possible proliferation of new registered business names will mean you need to be vigilent in making sure your trade names are protected.
A glimmer of hope - if you have been actively trading using an unregistered name since at least 29 October 2009 (one year from the effective date of the act), then the National Consumer Commission cannot enforce Section 79 of the Act.
a excerpt from the article written 11 March 2010 by Thingle Pather, Director in the Department of Professional Practice at KPMG Inc and member of the SAICA Legal and Compliance Committee entitled "Consumer Protection Act to outlaw “trading as” names of companies" and published on the SAICA website.
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