China’s labor law provides for a 44-hour work week, but its regulations provide for a 40 hour work week and most municipalities enforce the 40-hour work week, but recognize that this workweek may not be practical for certain employees. A “flexible” working hours system is thus permitted for “senior management” as an exception to this
The Three Fundamental Rules for China Contracts To ensure that your contracts are enforceable in China, it is important that they adhere to these three fundamental rules: Jurisdiction: Always specify a court within China for resolving legal disputes. Governing Law: Ensure that Chinese laws govern the contract. Language: Use Mandarin Chinese as the official language
The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) enforces U.S. economic and trade sanctions. OFAC sanctions generally block all U.S. individuals and entities – including in some cases U.S. companies’ foreign subsidiaries – from transacting business with comprehensively sanctioned countries, such as Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Russia, and Syria, or sanctioned
A technology company contacted one of our China lawyers months after having started selling its software into China. This company came to us seeking help in deciding whether to continue selling its software from the United States or to form a China WFOE and start selling through that entity. The first thing we told this
To describe employer and employee taxes in China as complicated is an understatement. My law firm usually advices our clients to secure bookkeeping/accounting assistance for this and we do not get much involved with calculating these figures. However, a client of ours for whom we are handling a number of China employment law matters requested
Our China company formation lawyers spoke with a software company the other day with fifteen “independent contractors” in China they view as “part of the corporate family.” This company was looking to form a WFOE in China, but they said they were in no rush. The first thing we did was tell them that what
English Translations of Chinese Laws Every couple of weeks, someone asks one of our China lawyers for an English translation of a Chinese law or cites one of our blog posts as an explanation for a decision they made or are contemplating making. The Pitfalls of Using Translated Chinese Laws for Decision Making China’s laws
Companies seeking to form a China WFOE are often confused about WFOE minimum registered capital requirements. Part of the confusion stems from disreputable entity formation companies that claim to know exactly how much will be required and boast of their ability to get the Chinese government to agree to a low amount. Under Chinese law,
The Chinese Portion of Your Contract is What Matters One of the most common trix employed by Chinese companies against American and European companies is fooling the American/European company into believing that the English version of their contract actually matters. My law firm’s China lawyers often see this from companies that come to us for
I was recently emailing with a reporter regarding how Memoranda of Understanding, (MOU) and Letters of Intent (LOIs) are so different in China than in the United States/Britain and how that difference often causes early discord between Chinese and American companies. We started the discussion by talking about the differences in the meaning of Memoranda
