Entrepreneurs or small business owners should know the basic of everything including accounting, marketing, advertising, governmental policies, laws, and others. Also, they should know and the basics of business law to avoid failure relating to contract management or litigation.

Why should small or single entrepreneurs learn about business laws?

In order to promote the business, the governments always update the rules and regulations for businesses from time to time as it helps the community as a whole to grow together. Accordingly, it is important to know about modernized governmental policies and rules. Therefore, if any business wants to work without any hurdles then an entrepreneur should be up to date with your governmental laws. 

For those who are beginners in the business industry, then all that is fresh for them. In order to learn, as a fresher or a beginner, the entrepreneur must have to visit numerous websites relating to business law and understand the basic knowledge of business law from them and it would be a great start for fresh or new entrepreneurs. To achieve a successful legal business everyone has to read professional guidelines. In most of the cases, the regulations are obligatory by the governments on businesses which are mostly classified into three categories: Taxes, relations with employees, and trade-related regulations which can be national or international.

The list of certain things that to keep in mind while conducting business in different countries:

• • Have some basic understanding of the general rules, regulations, and governmental policies of doing business in that particular state or country.

• • Need to have proper license and paperwork to conduct business.

• • Hire local business lawyers to aware of a particular law to ensure that an entrepreneur is not violating any laws or committing any unlawful activities but is costly and tough in small or single entrepreneurs.

• • There should be customer representatives to handle their problems.

• • Business conduct includes that the company is up to date with the country’s business laws and ensures all business practices are legitimate and lawful

Hiring a legal advisor is not possible for everyone especially for single and small entrepreneurs some small business law categories that small entrepreneurs need to take care of regardless of the type of business a person is running i.e. Company formation law, Real estate, Taxes, Intellectual property law, Insurance law, Employment law, Information technology law, Dispute resolution & contract law, and others.

Company Formation Law-

Before starting the company, the entrepreneur has to be aware of what company you want to run basically what type of company you want to invest.

1. Limited liability

2. Public Company

3. Small type-time sole proprietorship

4. Family business

The Indian Companies Act, of 2013 states laws for each type of company. There are various pre and post-incorporation requirements that an entrepreneur needs to complete while setting up a business, starting with registering the company with a regional Registrar of Companies (RoC)

Real Estate Law-

An entrepreneur should be aware of the legal aspect to validate the purchase of any real estate. An entrepreneur must have a warranty deed or quit claim deed.  The deed transfers the property’s old owner to the new owner in a legal way. A deed that makes Entrepreneurs free and removes them from the load is called a warranty deed.

There is a certain law that divides the consideration so entrepreneurs must be aware of them. When it comes to property-associated transaction and construction then there are differences in every state and district within them like residential and commercial zones and these have their personal requirement which has to have complied with.

Tax Law-

Every entrepreneur’s primary financial concerns would be regarding their tax payment and rebate. If any accidental misfortune arises on tax payment then it leads the entrepreneur to severe penalization. Therefore it is very important to get advice on tax payments and get familiarized with the low taxes. Also, take support from professional law consultants to safeguard that claims and payments are all made in a proper way which gives approval to the entrepreneurs and law also.

Intellectual property law

Fundamentally, it refers to those ideas that are governed by ownership and these ideas cannot be borrowed, copied or used without the approval of the proprietor or creator. Violating the rights of intellectual property is considered a disciplinary offense by law.

Patents, trademarks, and copyright usually protect intellectual property. Copyrights laws are those laws that protect intellectual property from being copied unlawfully. Books, articles or other important pieces of information which are published are usually copyrighted and protect the owner and author over the intellectual property. Software, electronic goods, machinery etc all are sheltered by patents. Trademarks are another important of intellectual property. Commonly, trademarks are only extended within the scope of a single business field and it also defends interest and brand individuality.

Insurance law

Commonly, Insurance is very beneficial or useful to enterprises but it often is mistaken to be financial liabilities over the businesses. Each and every entrepreneur must go with the number of insurance categories to save their businesses from any kind of sudden market change. There are many different types of insurance policies in which firms invest like property insurances to guard the office, equipment, and others. Health insurances for worker and employee, worker compensation insurances in the event that if an employee is injured during the job then he/she get compensation under this, and business interruption insurance.

Employment law

Generally, the employment law differs from state to state but still entrepreneurs should have basic knowledge of the labor standards rules and regulation i.e. entrepreneurs should know who comes under the definition of term labour and also which regulates minimum wage, child labour bans, overtimes rules, and recordkeeping requirements. Also, entrepreneurs should connect a lawyer to make a standard agreement which every employee of the company should sign and comply with. The agreement must include about employees’ salary, tenure, obligations, duties, termination, dispute resolution mechanism and other important clauses. The agreement will help the entrepreneur in resolving any kind of dispute between employer and employee.

Privacy laws 

In today’s time, privacy laws has very major part to play as at present there is no specific act in India but a Personal Data Protection Bill (PDPB) has been in process since 2018 but in Europe and California the Acts with big restrictions is been introduces and also amended many time which are General data protection regulations (GDPR) and California Consumer privacy act. Once such bill introduced India every business has to comply with its regulation and in my personal opinion the bill gives lots and lots of rights to consumer for their data protection as it restricts the business from using anyone’s information without their permission with some exceptions. The moto is to put the liability of maintaining consumer’s privacy on business or entrepreneurs. The one who hold all the information should have the proper means to protect the data from leaking it in public domain as it is important to take care of privacy as its one of our fundamental right.

Why is it learning about business laws favorable for entrepreneurs?

In todays, time there are so many business and entrepreneurs who are struggling every day to comply with all the rules and regulations. As, in India it’s pretty complicated to comply with all the states and centres laws. Also, to takes certifications such as e-waste and other environmental certifications are too expensive. Which results into failure of the business model. To handle such legal issues an entrepreneur should and must hire a lawyer with expertise in business laws. Appointing a lawyer is an important thing to do as if they do not comply with the whole legal framework, then business would be in some serious trouble. But if the business cannot afford a hiring a legal lawyer then the other solution is every entrepreneur should prepare or train themselves with some basic legal knowledge.  

Here are a few reasons as to why a law is beneficial for every entrepreneur

• • To cut cost- Arming oneself with legal knowledge would extremely helpful in reducing legal cost because businesses are drives profit and losses.

Thus, if there is any little issue in businesses that dripping down the businesses investing money. In order to become stable, the growth of business then there are different laws that may help entrepreneurs to resolve problems.

• • Law strengthens the business- Everyone has to agree that the law provides a lawful recognition to business. How much as good as a start-up but if a law does not distinguish your start up then the entrepreneur would be in a great mess as if he/she cannot ethically claim.

Basically, a law is a great instrument for every entrepreneur in this area of competition.

• • Law is mandatory to learn and keep in mind – Entrepreneurs are the leader of a start-up and if the captain ignores problems then the start-up will start falling.

For example, a big corporation runs into crores of rupees and losses just because of small legal decisions, and on the other by one right decision corporation also earned a lot of profit in crores.

Lawyers are experts but only on those subjects which are related to laws. Professionally, a lawyer cannot stand in between the client and entrepreneurs and cannot assess the situation. 

Lawyers only ones who give advice to entrepreneurs once they are done and it is up to the entrepreneur to decide what is best for him and for his start-up in a strategic way.

Conclusion

So that, it is important for every single business owner, entrepreneur, manager, or other professional to have some basic knowledge or understanding of some laws which help them to make better judgments. Just as there are various laws that apply to people, there is a huge body of law that applies to business. Business needs these laws for the same reason that people do; to define unacceptable behavior, to provide certainty and stability, to protect the public, and to provide a mechanism for business.