As you learned in the All About You feature, the decision to incorporate or not is complex.

Question:

As you learned in the “All About You” feature, the decision to incorporate or not is complex. After you have completed your post-secondary education, you may be an entrepreneur and may need to decide if and when to incorporate your business. And if you decide to incorporate, you will also need to know more about how. You will also have to decide whether to incorporate with the provincial or federal government. Benefits to incorporating federally include the right to use your company name across the country (a status almost as heightened as trademark protection), the right to carry on business anywhere in Canada, global recognition as an incorporated company, and bilingual service from federal government employees who provide services to corporations. If your company starts out doing business in one province but intends to expand into other provinces, you may want to incorporate federally to make that transition easier later on.

Almost any kind and size of business can incorporate federally under the Canada Business Corporations Act. However, some types of organizations, such as financial institutions, cooperatives, Chambers of Commerce, and non-profit organizations, must incorporate under different legislation. Anyone who is 18 years old or older, is not of unsound mind, and who has never been bankrupt, along with any company or corporate body, may incorporate under the Canada Business Corporations Act.

Instructions

For the following scenarios, state whether you should incorporate federally under the Canada Business Corporations Act. If not, state the form of business you should choose or whether you should incorporate provincially. Provide explanations for your answers.

(a) You are 17 and live in Ottawa. You want to open a lawn-mowing business in Ottawa and across the river in Gatineau, Quebec, employing several students as a summer job.

(b) After you graduate from post-secondary education, you and two friends have a hard time finding a job and decide to start a non-profit organization to help youths find work.

(d) After graduating with an accounting degree, you start a chain of national bookkeeping and accounting franchises called Account on Us. You expect to expand quickly because you think the name is catchy and people will remember it and spread it by word of mouth and social media.