Posted

Thursday, July 01, 2010

Stop Small Business Unfair Contracts!

All businesses are in for a big shake-up. TheTrade Practices Acthas been amended to force businesses to have fair contracts with consumers. Given its importance, it hasn’t received a lot of media coverage. We’ve provided a summary of the new laws here:

<http://www.contractworld.com.au/campaigns/ica-integrity-campaign-unfair-contracts-TPA-amendments.php>

and links to the legislation identifying the fair contract requirements here:

<http://www.contractworld.com.au/campaigns/ica-integrity-campaign-identify-unfair-contracts.php>

If you’re selling to consumers, you need to review your contracts and practices to ensure compliance.

But there’s disappointment. The Rudd Government excluded finance and business-to-business contracts. That is, finance and business-to-business contracts are allowed (by default) to be ‘unfair’.

This is not good enough.

I’ve put together a discussion as to why small businesses, at least, should also be protected from unfair contracts. It’s a longish discussion, but we’re dealing with critical issues, including financial contracts. This goes to the heart of successful business relationships:

<http://www.contractworld.com.au/campaigns/ica-integrity-campaign-stop-small-business-unfair-contracts.php>

Fair contracts for small/micro business people is a key campaign for Independent Contractors Australia to which we have a long-term commitment.

Regards
Ken Phillips (Exec. Dir.) and
the team at Independent Contractors of Australia
<http://www.contractworld.com.au/index.php>