Partnership agreement

Create a modern partnership agreement

This is a professionally drawn, comprehensive document designed to protect and help you, just as you would expect your solicitor to produce. As well as paragraphs relating to law, it contains a large set of commercial and practical provisions that will help you manage your business and inter-partner relationships. This document should give you a high level of protection in today’s environment.

Despite the completeness and thoroughness of this document, editing is easy. It is written in plain English, without legal jargon or complicated paragraph referencing so that you can simply and easily delete what you don't need.

Why you need such a comprehensive document

The law relating to partnerships is over 100 years old and is very basic indeed. It doesn't reflect how modern day partnerships operate. A good agreement therefore should not only improve on the default provisions, but also include paragraphs that set out in greater detail how your business will work.

Other partnership agreements on the Internet, particularly ‘short’ versions, might cover the basics to form the legal relationship, but they aren’t likely to protect your interest in your new business sufficiently. Far more issues are considered in this document than in any other template we have seen.

For example, this agreement provides a set of easy-to-edit paragraphs covering intellectual property protection in depth. Most businesses have valuable intellectual property, whether know-how or designs, but few partnership agreements address intellectual property, whether recognising who brings it into partnership, or who has the right to use it during and once the partnership ends.

If your business has less at stake, as small trader or service provider, we offer a similar agreement where the partners are trusted family and friends.

Who should use this agreement

A partnership agreement is not specific to a particular type of business. Its purpose is to set out the arrangements between the parties about how they will work, in much the same way as a shareholders’ agreement for a company does so. So this template has a wide range of uses.

It is ideal for partnerships with between 2 and 10 partners, but could be used for larger partnerships as well.

Ownership of assets and share of income and expenses does not have to be in equal proportions. Your sharing ratio could be 50:50, but it could also be 60:40, 70:30 or any other.

This agreement can be used if one or more of the partners is 'sleeping' or 'silent', i.e. contributes finances, experience or assets but does not take part in the day to day running of the business.

Whilst partners in most partnership arrangements are likely to be human individuals, this agreement can be used where one or more is a company or a non profit organisation.

Your 'business' as partners could be a single specific project, such as a technology development project, and does not necessarily have to be commercial in nature.

When to use this document

A partnership agreement is likely to be required in the following circumstances:

• when two or more people start a new business or project together

• when a new person takes a share in an existing business operated by one person

• when existing partners want to formalise their partnership agreement

• when existing partners want to change the balance of control and ownership of the business

Main contents

• Business of the partnership
• Partnership shares
• Partnership property
• Capital
• Drawings
• Loans to the business
• Banking arrangements
• Records and accounts
• Meetings and voting
• Holidays
• Absence
• Cars
• Insurance
• Good faith
• Partnership policies
• Restrictions on partners
• Intellectual property
• Confidentiality
• No competition
• Expulsion
• Termination of the partnership
• After termination
• Indemnity for the partnership
• Publicity and announcements
• Comprehensive termination provisions to protect on-going partners
• Other terms