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Legal Services for SMEs
Welcome to SMEDA Legal Services! We add value to the business of Small and Medium Entrepreneurs (SMEs) through facilitation in: (a) resolving their legal problems (b) creating awareness of legal rights (c) disseminating information on existing regulatory requirements through training courses, seminars, self help manuals and guides, (d) frequently asked questions, and (e) interaction with regulatory authorities and service providers for removing legal impediments.
How do we Help
1. Business Registration and Licensing Quidelines
2. Referrals to Network of Legal Service Providers.
3. In-House Legal Opinion.
4. Information Dissemination
5. Regulatory Reviews and Policy Inputs in Existing Laws
6. Legal Documentation
7. Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
1) Business Registration and licensing guidelines
In order to facilitate and educate the SMEs about different regulatory requirements / procedures, we have developed business registration and licensing guidelines in an easy to understand language, both in English and Urdu. These guidelines cover almost all the subjects such as, Registration procedure for company, partnership, sales tax, NTN etc and are not only available free of cost from SMEDA offices but can also be downloaded from our website.
2) Referrals to network of Legal Service Providers.
If you are facing a problem for example you want to challenge an action of a person or an authority taken against you, or you want to get a stay order from a court of law against a proposed action threatened to be taken against you by any person or an authority, or you want to get a particular benefit like exemption from customs duties and taxes etc. that is being denied to you by the authorities without any reasonable cause or you want to recover your amount from a person or authority arising from a contract or other relationship, or if you are facing any difficulty in calculating your payable tax and filing of tax returns, we can arrange a specialized service provider for you who could represent you in any court of law, tribunal or authority.
Benefits of approaching legal service providers through us:
• It is cost effective,
• You will be able to get the service provider according to your legal problem for example if you have a tax problem you will be referred to a service provider who is expert in tax matters.
• Any matter that is referred by us, we regularly monitor the progress of such matter and get progress reports from the service provider on behalf of the client thereby reducing the burden and pain of the client to follow up the matter.
It is however, not mandatory to approach the network of legal service providers through us only. You can also approach the desired service provider directly by selecting the one from the list of these legal service providers available on our website.
3) In-House Legal Opinion.
We provide legal opinion on almost all the Subjects of Legal Facilitation. If you are facing a legal problem for example a legal notice has been issued to you by a government department / regulatory authority for violation of any law, rule or regulation, or any person has served a legal notice or has filed a suit or other legal proceedings against you arising out of a contract or other relationship, or for that matter any of your employee has sued you in any labor court, or you need an opinion on the applicability and or effect of a particular provision of law etc. you may contact us for seeking our opinion on the legal problem being faced by you and the propose course of action to be adopted for the solution of that problem.
You can get the desired legal opinion either by writing to us through courier, by fax or by e-mail, through a phone call or by visiting us personally at our contact points or seek online legal opinion
4) Information dissemination for creating awareness among SMEs through conduct and facilitation in conducting training courses, seminars etc.
We at SMEDA believe that information dissemination amongst SMEs about legal and regulatory environment in Pakistan is vital for their growth and capacity building. With the objective to spread knowledge of the methods / requirements of compliance of different laws and regulations, we hold training courses and seminars on need basis. If your industry, association or chamber of commerce desires a training course on any legal or regulatory matter you may contact us for holding of training course on such legal matter.
5) Regulatory Reviews and Policy inputs in Existing Laws Affecting SMEs and other legislative measures pertaining to SMEs.
We believe that conducive business environment is of much importance for the growth of SMEs. To ensure conducive legal and regulatory environment for SMEs, we keep on reviewing the existing legislation. This is done on self identification of impediments in the legislation or on the identification of any such impediment by the stakeholders i.e. trade organizations / chambers of associations etc.
If you are feeling any problem in the legislation or if in your opinion any legislation is an impediment in your growth you can send us your input / suggestion / query to legal@smeda.org.pk
6) Legal Documentation
We also facilitate you in documenting your dealings and understandings with your partners, associates, employees, buyers, attorneys, consultants etc. We facilitate not only through vetting of your already written documents but also by the provision of sample documents over the counter for your understanding and knowledge.
Legal documentation is very much vital for the growth of SMEs. If you want to start a business and or if you are already doing a business or you want to wind up a particular business, documenting your sale, purchase, lease and or mortgage transactions etc. will be beneficial to you in following ways:
• It will become a very good evidence of your dealings with other person(s);
• In case of any dispute regarding any sale, purchase, lease and or mortgage entered by you, you will be able to prove your claim before any court, authority or tribunal more easily as against a claim on the basis of oral dealings;
• Documentary evidence is given a preference by the courts of law as against oral claims.
Contact Us
SMEDA Legal Experts
SMEDA Helpdesk at Regional offices and Regional Business Centers. Click here |
