Two people self employed. One trading name?

[BurchellCouriers]

Good evening all,

Apologies for my first post being a "need advice" post but this is my first steps into self employment so have never been here before, anyway I hope to hang around and learn.

Anyway myself and my Brother have been made redundant from our current employer(we worked in the same department) and we've both decided we're going to go down the self employed courier route. Initially we're going to be doing sub contractor work for another company to keep the money flowing but we'd eventually like to get our own customers.
What we'd like to do is use the same Trading name but no money would be shared between us in any way. Is this possible or still considered a partnership? Is a Trading name a legal thing or just something for show for self employed businesses?

Thank you for your time
Mark

 

[paulears]

Sounds nice when you are good friends. If one of you does better than the other, or worse still, one makes a bad decision, the other suffers. With agreement it can work, in the same way a franchise, but can make banking difficult. My business has a rather long name, that is repeatedly shortened to a contraction, and by bank accept either on a cheque, even if perhaps they shouldn't. John Jones trading as Jones Brother, and Frank Jones trading as Jones Brothers would be ok as long as the intention is genuine. It's just what happens when you fall out?

 

[Maxwell83]

In theory (and presuming neither will go after the other for any intellectual property infringements like passing off) two separate people can happily have the same trading name - a quick search will find numerous businesses with the same name up and down the country. This is because if you trade as "tip top couriers", your trading name is "Dan Jones T/A tip top couriers". Your brother would "Mike Jones T/A tip top couriers" and you are both completely distinct legal entities.

Everyone will advertises as tip top couriers, but for all legal and financial purposes, the actual business is still distinctly identifiable from all the others by the full trading name which includes the individuals name (or to complicate things it could be a ltd company using a trading name).

So in theory, yes you can do what you are suggesting. But as Paulears points out, what happens if there is a disagreement, or if your brother starts getting bad reviews on the internet and the reviewers don't bother identifying him as Mike Jones T/A tip top couriers, but just 'tip top couriers'? This will ultimately hurt your business. Alternatively, what if you build up a massive loyal client base and really get the name out there with all of your hard work, and then your brother starts getting customers that really were meant for you?

If you really aren't worried about these things (which may actually be the case as he is your brother after all) then you can proceed as you suggest, but just take these things into account. At some point, maybe in years to come, these business may have grown substantially and be worth a lot to one/both of you. That is the time when problems like the ones I have described above are likely to show up and by then it will be too late.

 

[BurchellCouriers]

That's fantastic advice and thanks to both of you for taking time to give it!

I totally understand where you're coming from and will have a think on the possibility disagreements as much as I'm saying it won't ever happen, I suppose you never really know till it does.

Thank you once again.