Trustees Seminar / Less than two months left to register

APRSF Seminar for Trustees and Advisers – 5 – 6 June 2018

 

We are running our next two day seminar at the beginning of June.  The seminar will be delivered in Czech.

Click here for more information on the seminar.

 

 

Less than two months left to register your trust

Trust funds that were established before the end of 2017 must be registered on the Register of Trusts by the end of June.  Trusts that do not register will cease to exist.

If you have not started on the registration process, now is the time. If you are interested, we are be happy to help you with this process for a flat fee of CZK 1,500. For more information please do not hesitate to contact us at info@trusty.cz.

If you decide to register your trust fund yourself, you can do so through the following link: https://isesf.justice.cz/

 

APRSF Educational Seminar: Confidentiality / Reserve Recipients

As you may be aware, we are founding members of the APRSF, Asociace pro podporu a rozvoj svěřenských fondů, z. s. .

APRSF has a forthcoming seminar that might be of interest to you on the topic of current issues around client confidentiality from a trust perspective.

This will cover a range of areas including the current situation with CRS (Common Reporting Standard) and other relevant areas (including GDPR).

The seminar will also include a short presentation from Pavla Gomba – Executive Director of UNICEF Czech Republic on the topic of Reserve Recipient clauses.

The event will include wine and nibbles as well as the chance to network with other APRSF members.

Details are as follows:

Date: Tuesday, 3 April

Time: 17:00

Venue: PricewaterhouseCoopers Česká republika s.r.o., City Green Court, Hvězdova 2c, 140 00 Praha 4

Attendance Fee:: Free for APRSF Members and guests, 400 CZK for others. If you are not an APRSF Member and would like to attend, please let us know and we will invite you as our guest..

Registration: Please register by email to info@trusty.cz

Update: Register of Trusts

After a lot of teething troubles, the register of trusts is now finally up and running properly.

For those of you with existing trusts, it is important that you register your trust before the end of June. If you fail to do so, your trust will cease to be valid.

There are two ways to do this:

  1. Do it yourself: You can register your trust yourself by following the instructions at https://isesf.justice.cz/ Unfortunately, we cannot say this is a simple process. That is why we are offering a second option;
  2. We can do it for you: We can prepare all the necessary documents for you, send them to you for signature and then submit them to the relevant registration court. As this is a somewhat time-consuming process, we can offer this service to you for a fixed fee of 1,500 CZK per trust plus the cost of any disbursements (official copies etc)

If you would like to take advantage of this offer, please email us at info@trusty.cz and we will get to work.

We open a new office in Brno

One of our weaknesses in the four years of our company’s existence has been the lack of a physical presence in Moravia. This is reflected in the fact that our current clients are disproportionately from Bohemia. For almost all clients at least one personal meeting is an important step in establishing a trust, and the trip from Brno to Prague has sometimes been too much of an obstacle.

That’s why we are delighted to announce the launch of our new office in Brno.

Our presence in Moravia is via a partnership with well respected Brno law firm, Bulinský, Vávra & Partners. As well as being a senior lawyer with the firm, Mgr. Monika Hofrichterová, who will be representing our interests in the region, is very knowledgeable about trusts and is a graduate of the APRSF Trust Training course.

Clients from the region will now be able to establish a trust and obtain professional trust advice without needing to travel to Prague. Our Brno presence is open now and can be contacted at brno@trusty.cz

We have good working relationships with a number of other law firms in Moravia, and it is important for us to emphasise that our Brno presence is designed only for direct clients, that is clients who contact us directly, be it by telephone or through the internet. In the case of business sourced from lawyers and other professionals, because we respect your client relationships, this business will continue to be handled from Prague

A Thank You from our Charitable Partners

A Thank You from our Charitable Partners

As you may be aware, we support Nadace Partnerství by providing a grant of 500 CZK for every trust we establish which they use to support the planning of trees.

We have a tree in our company logo and we think a tree is an excellent metaphor for what we do.
If you want to grow a strong tree you first need to plant a seed.  When you plant a seed, you give a gift to the future.

Some patience is then required as is some careful gardening.  A new seedling needs care and attention but with that care and attention it will grow strong enough to withstand strong winds and will provide shade and fruit to our children and grandchildren and for generations to come.

But for a tree to grow strong and straight, you need a great gardener.  We are the gardeners of your personal family tree.

If you would like to see a report setting out how Nadace Partnerství has spent these donations, please click here. (Unfortunately it is available in Czech only)

Thank you from Nadace Partnerstvi

As many of you know, for every new trust we establish, we provide funding to Nadace Partnerství to improve our childrens’ world by planting and protecting trees in the Czech Republic. This Christmas we are making another donation and we look forward to making even larger donations as our business prospers in the future.  You can learn more about Nadace Partnerství on their website.

For those of you who established a trust this year, here’s a note of thanks from Nadace Partnerstvi

Register of Trusts

As you are probably aware, there has been a proposal on the table for a new register of trusts for some time.  We thought we would take this opportunity to update you on what’s happening and the likely structure of the new register.

Part of the register requirements have already passed into law, and these will require all trusts (and companies) to declare who their ‘skutečný majitel’ is.  (In English we call this person the ‘Ultimate beneficial owner’).

For trusts, this person will be the one who exercises effective control over the trust.  Usually this will be either the trustees, but might in some cases be the founder.  Who exactly it is will depend on the structure of the trust.

If we are administering your trust, we will be advising you in the new year who you should declare as the ‘skutečný majitel’ and will prepare the necessary deceleration as a part of our standard Administration service.

It is important to note that this information will not be publicly accessible and will only be available to the state and to other people with a legitimate interest (eg. banks).

The second part of the register is still passing thorough the final stage of the legislative process.  However, it seems unlikely that it will change now, so we can inform you of what we expect to be required.

Essentially most Trust documents will need to be filed in the register and each trust will be allocated an Identification number. However, the public will have only very limited access to this information, being able to see only:

  • The name of the trust
  • Its purpose
  • The date it commenced
  • The trust’s IČ: (identification number)
  • The number of trustees of the trust and how they act (ie, individually, by majority or unanimously)
  • The date on which the trust was registered
  • A little additional data only if the trust owns a large business, and
  • Anything else that the trustees voluntarily wish to make public (such as the names of the Trustees)

Note that this list does not include the name of the founder, the supervisor if any, or the beneficiaries.  Also important to note is that, unlike companies, there are no fees for filing documents with the register.

In addition to this public information, you will also need to file these details – but they will be non-public:

    • The name, address and identifying details of the founder, the supervisor – if any -and any named beneficiaries and, for beneficiaries who are not specifically named, how they are defined.
    • The name address and identifying details of the ‘skutečný majitel’ – and a statement as to the basis on which he or she is identified as such.

Any trust documents which include any of the non-public information (and of course this means almost all Trust documents including the statute and contract), will also be non-public.

Is this good or bad?

For most of our clients this is a good result, striking an excellent balance between protection of your personal privacy and the need to eliminate potential misuse of trusts.  It will also help significantly build the acceptance of trusts, especially since you will now have the all important Identification number as well as the ability to provide people who ask with an extract from the register.

If you have any questions about how the new register will affect you, please don’t hesitate to contact us.

The Kateřina Šmídková Trust


Normally our clients prefer us to keep the work we have done for them confidential, but not all. The Czech Economics Society is one such exception. We recently worked with them to establish a fund in memory of the late Kateřina Šmídková, Director of Economic Research at the Czech National Bank and Professor of Economics at Charles University, who died after a long illness at the age of 46 years.

The Kateřina Šmídková Trust now provides a regular prize to encourage the work of female economists in the Czech Republic. We were very proud to be involved on this important project.

We have added a section to our site illustrating the potential uses of trusts for endowment purposes.

If you would be interested in contributing to this very worthy cause, please contact us and we will put you in touch with the Economics Society