Employment contracts for the Company Secretary, Dir-r etc

**planetit** · 25 October 2004, 14:40

Re: Employment contracts for the Company Secretary, Dir-r et

The role of company secretary is not that of an employee. So you don’t need an employment contract for them.

**AtW** · 25 October 2004, 14:47

Re: Employment contracts for the Company Secretary, Dir-r et

So you don’t need an employment contract for them.

The IR said its not self-employment and therefore employment :rolleyes

Its not my spouse who will do it and I will have to pay for some things if necessary, hence need for contract to keep person in question happy. :rolleyes

**silicondale** · 25 October 2004, 16:07

Don't do it !

If it's your own company, and just self plus spouse, don't !!

You don't actually need employment contracts for directors or company secretary. Nor do you even need directors service contracts.

If you have employment contracts you face two things in particular:

(1) National Minimum Wage legislation. May not be a problem now, but what if you stop receiving income from contracts ? say you have 6 months between contracts, or you decide to take a sabbatical and do some R&D ? With an employment contract your company must still keep on paying you salary.

(2) Employers liability insurance. Having employment contracts shows that your company has employees and must buy this useless (and nowadays expensive) form of insurance. Without the employment contract, directors and secretaries are just office-holders and you can argue there are no employees, hence you don't need the insurance.

**fiddleabout** · 25 October 2004, 16:27

Re: Don't do it !

> self plus spouse

Oh please - just look at who's asking - have you ever heard of a right hand being employed as a co-sec?

**AtW** · 25 October 2004, 18:31

Re: Don't do it !

You don't actually need employment contracts for directors or company secretary.

Ok, but how would I pay the Secretary for work that might need to be done while keeping IR friendly? The person in question is employed and would not like to be classed as self-employed again due to Class 2 NI - its just not worth the hassle. How to arrange payments in this case and stay legal?

Suppose I don't create contract for myself, how would I pay myself salary? Not that I plan to do it for some time, just curious.

**Bradley** · 25 October 2004, 23:42

Re:Employment Contracts

I thought that employment contracts were now compulsory?

In which case NMW will apply.

**xoggoth** · 26 October 2004, 10:27

Re: Re:Employment Contracts

Agree with silicondale. Whoever said otherwise is talking bulwarks.

**AtW** · 27 October 2004, 15:42

payment

so how would I pay the guy when I have to then if its not employment?

Original question was to be able to pay legally and avoid making him register self employed and pay Class 2 contributions.

**planetit** · 27 October 2004, 15:57

Re: payment

Atw,
How much are you thinking of paying this guy? Are you aware that the amount of work required of a company secretary (in a very small company) is precisely nothing? Most of us nominate CoSec who get paid nothing for the job (because they do no work) so don’t need an employment contract. The other way is to pay a company to be the secretary for you (some accountants will do this). It doesn’t cost very much, but they also do no work for it. Do you really want all the hassle of employing someone just to save them the hassle of sorting out the tax on this small amount of money?

Employment contracts for the Company Secretary, Dir-r etc