Anyone doing business under a name other than their legal name in Australia is supposed to register a business name so as not to breach the Business Names Registration Act 2011, and all business types (sole traders, companies, partnerships etc…) can register business names. The same legal entity can have more than one.
I think the question really is whether using a domain name is really the same as doing business as that name. For example, if Joe Bloggs owned flowers.com.au, and visiting the site showed a banner showing Joe Bloggs and underneath it the words Flower Shop, I think it is a reasonable case to say the business is trading as Joe Bloggs, and the Flowers part is identifying the service provided.
That said, Joe Bloggs could remedy the situation easily by registering Joe Bloggs Flowers - the auDA rules allow for registering domains that contain only part of the name (“Match means that the Domain Name being applied for is identical to one, some or all of words or numbers used in the Person’s Legal Name, Business Name or Australian Trade Mark. The Domain Name must use the words or numbers in the same order as they appear in the Person’s Legal Name, Business Name or Australian Trade Mark and must not include any additional words or numbers”). The Business Name registration rules have complex rules about duplicates, so if someone else already registered Joe Bloggs Flowers even though he had flowers.com.au, he could still come up with a different name that included the word Flowers and keep the domain. However, this would require paying to register the business name, and renewing it every year.
So it is creating a small extra expense for business owners that in some cases is probably not legally necessary, just to keep auDA happy.
Is that a problem for sole traders where the business name doesn’t match the registrant?
Anyone doing business under a name other than their legal name in Australia is supposed to register a business name so as not to breach the Business Names Registration Act 2011, and all business types (sole traders, companies, partnerships etc…) can register business names. The same legal entity can have more than one.
I think the question really is whether using a domain name is really the same as doing business as that name. For example, if Joe Bloggs owned flowers.com.au, and visiting the site showed a banner showing Joe Bloggs and underneath it the words Flower Shop, I think it is a reasonable case to say the business is trading as Joe Bloggs, and the Flowers part is identifying the service provided.
That said, Joe Bloggs could remedy the situation easily by registering Joe Bloggs Flowers - the auDA rules allow for registering domains that contain only part of the name (“Match means that the Domain Name being applied for is identical to one, some or all of words or numbers used in the Person’s Legal Name, Business Name or Australian Trade Mark. The Domain Name must use the words or numbers in the same order as they appear in the Person’s Legal Name, Business Name or Australian Trade Mark and must not include any additional words or numbers”). The Business Name registration rules have complex rules about duplicates, so if someone else already registered Joe Bloggs Flowers even though he had flowers.com.au, he could still come up with a different name that included the word Flowers and keep the domain. However, this would require paying to register the business name, and renewing it every year.
So it is creating a small extra expense for business owners that in some cases is probably not legally necessary, just to keep auDA happy.
The checker complains a domain will be invalid if it matches a sole trader’s ABN business name but the domain registrant is the person’s real name
I don’t know if auDA provides a checker - this might be a bug in some registrar checker given the rules say business names are allowed?
It’s the one linked from help.com.au
Probably bugged