Does Your Website Sell Stuff In Other Countries?
If you’re doing business online in other countries, take the time to ensure that your website complies with e-commerce laws in those places. At a minimum, this includes making sure that your website has all of the requisite legal documentation.
For example, let’s say that you sell 70% of your products in the United States, 10% in Canada, 5% in the United Kingdom, and 5% in Australia.
You’re going to want to make sure that you’re not violating laws in these countries by the way you sell there. This means retaining a legal professional, such as an attorney or solicitor, who practices Internet law in each country that you sell to ensure that you’re not breaking the law.
If money is tight, you may want to start with the country where the largest amount of your sales comes from and then proceed to the next largest, etc. when doing the compliance checks. Although there are risks in this method, you’re minimizing them by going after the biggest potential problem markets first.
For a basic overview of website law in the United Kingdom, check out Website legal information: basic requirements. For a basic review of U.S. website requirements, there’s a 7-Step Website Legal Checklist. Of course, general information that you find on the Internet is not a substitute for professional legal advice.
If you’ve ever had legal problems doing business online in another country, feel free to leave a comment here about it.
About the Author
With an advanced international law degree from Georgetown University and more than 15 years of real world legal experience, Attorney Mike Young is President of the Internet Ethics Council and creator of Website Legal Forms Generator software. He helps entrepreneurs protect and grow their businesses online.
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Thank you very much for conveying the message of how online business makes money through online. It is really good information for the beginners.
Hi
Thank you for the article. I wonder if you can help with a question?
If you run an on-line business you can in effect work from anywhere in the world. But – if you are working in any given country I assume you will be obliged to have the appropriate working visa for that country?? If issues of residency where “grey”, and it was unclear which country you resided at because you travelled the world while you were working – which country’s laws would you be subject to???
I’m finding this entire area very confusing, it’s difficult to remain a law abiding citizen, when it’s so hard to establish exactly what the law is!!!! Any light you can shed on the subject would be very much appreciated!!!