Background
To begin with this was a very small two man business. However, over the last year, work has increased, they now rent offices and employ three members of staff and can see a need to employ 2 or more extra staff as the year progresses
John is single and Paul married, with two young children
Challenges
It was Paul who was keen to seek advice because it is John who has the marketing skills and Paul could see that if John left the business, died or could not work through sickness the business would suffer financially. They wished to discuss what could be done to protect the situation.
What we did
The first thing we did was to ask if there was a partnership agreement in place. There was not so we sent them to a solicitor to draw one up
The agreement put in place the need to have capital available in the event of the death of one of the partners and required both partners to insure themselves to provide an income should they be unable to work through sickness. This then enabled the surviving partner to continue the business without a liability to the other partner or his family
The Results
John and Paul were able to draw up a 5 year business plan because they were both confident about the continuity of the business.
John and Paul continue to seek advice on means of protecting the business, we have subsequently advised on insuring other key persons within the business and on employee benefits