A proprietary company must have at least one director who ordinarily resides in Australia. Only an individual who is at least 18 may be appointed as a director of a company.
Before a person can be appointed as a director, they will need to obtain a director identification number. You can apply for a director identification number via the Australian Business Registry Services – Director identification number | Australian Business Registry Services (ABRS).
A proprietary company is not required to have a secretary but if they do have one or more secretaries, one of them must also ordinarily reside in Australia. Only an individual who is at least 18 may be appointed as a secretary.
The appointor (sometimes called Principal or Guardian) is the ultimate controller of a trust. The appointor has the power to appoint and remove the trustees. It is not essential that the trust has an appointor. CGW deeds will work with or without an appointor.
However, it is useful to have an appointor to change the trustee in situations such as death or insolvency of a trustee. The appointor may be an exisitng trustee, a named beneficiary or a third party.
Some trusts have an ‘independent’ appointor (such as an accountant) to reduce the risk of individual beneficiaries being held to control the trust.
A trustee is personally liable for debts incurred on behalf of the trust and, although the trustee has the right to be indemnified out of the assets of the trust, it is usually preferable for a sole purpose company to be trustee so that the risk of trust activities is quarantined to the assets in the trust.
With individual trustees, all assets have to be transferred into the name of a new trustee if a current trustee resigns or dies. However if the trustee is a company there is no need to transfer assets if a director dies or resigns.
The costs associated with maintaining a corporate trustee are not substantial.
The directors of a trustee company can be beneficiaries in their individual capacity while still being in control of the trust.
CGW Structures is a trusted Australian provider of entity establishment services, supporting accountants, advisers, business owners and individuals across Australia. We make it easy to set up the right structure for your needs, whether you’re starting a new business, managing investments or planning for the future.
Our entity establishment services cover a wide range of structures, including companies, trusts, self-managed superannuation funds (SMSFs) and more.
At CGW Structures, we focus on making the process straightforward and compliant. Our documents are regularly updated to reflect the latest Australian legislation and best practice, so you can be confident your entity is set up correctly from the start. We provide a full suite of documents for each structure, such as constitutions, trust deeds, minutes, registers and application forms, delivered electronically for your convenience.
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