Blog Posts: May 2011

This is always a difficult one to call, because the circumstances can vary so much. But there is one rule of thumb. Can you afford to lose it? If you can’t, don’t do it. There must always be a significant risk in these cases that you will not be repaid. The emotional pressure is always very great, and this clouds judgement on both sides. Of course, like a marriage, it always starts with optimism and good intentions. What can possibly go wrong? Invariably where lending money is conc.... (read more...)

What is Forfeiture? Forfeiture is the landlord’s right to re-enter business premises and bring a lease to an end. In general a lease can be forfeited where the tenant does not pay the rent, breaches the other terms of the lease or becomes insolvent. Forfeiture is a powerful tool for landlords to use where they wish to remove a tenant and terminate the lease. Tenants should note that the right to forfeit can only be exercised by the landlord if it is specifically referred to in the lease..... (read more...)

Details about new rules on the use of cookies by website operators have recently been published. There’s not much time to get to grips with them as they come into force on 26th May 2011. Initial guidance from the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) issued only last week provides a few pointers on how we can expect the rules to be interpreted. The main effect of the new rules is that if you are a website owner you will need consent from a user of your site to store a cookie on the.... (read more...)

The age of emails has blurred the boundaries of what is a contract and what is not. It’s very easy to fire off an email quickly, but do you realise that such an email has the same status as a proper legal contract? Without expert legal input and advice on terms, businesses could be leaving themselves open to problems. A response to an email outlining details of an agreement, and agreeing to undertake the work, is effectively a binding contract, but it is unlikely to be a ‘watertight .... (read more...)

Many directors of SMEs are taking huge risks when it comes to paying themselves without realising – and it is often on their accountant’s advice. It is very common that a company’s accountant will advise directors of owner-managed companies to take the majority of their pay as dividends with either no salary or a very low one. This has a financial advantage, particularly as far as national insurance contributions are concerned. The director then simply draws a monthly sum from .... (read more...)

Acts of war, extreme weather conditions or a terrorist attack might seem like good enough reasons not to be held to deadlines or the precise terms of a contract. But this is not always so. Volcanic ash clouds, prolonged severe winter weather and flooding, the terrible impact of the earthquake, resulting tsunami and nuclear problems in Japan, tornadoes in the USA and uprisings in various North African and Middle Eastern states, have peppered news reports for the last 12 months. But it may surpris.... (read more...)