Structures Built in a Hurry
and Fixed Later

Corporate Work in Peel Region

Brampton's business base is heavily weighted toward logistics, freight, warehousing and the construction trades, and that mix produces a particular set of legal problems. Owner-managed transport companies grow quickly, take on drivers and subcontractors, and often reach twenty or thirty employees before anyone has written down who owns what.

The result is that we are frequently asked to fix a structure rather than build one. A company incorporated years ago with a single share class, two founders who never signed a shareholders' agreement, and a third person who was promised equity in conversation. None of that is unusual, and all of it is easier to resolve before there is a dispute than after.

Driver and owner-operator classification is the other recurring question here. Whether someone is an employee or a contractor is not settled by what the contract calls them, and getting it wrong reaches into employment standards, tax and insurance at the same time. We advise on the structure and, where the arrangement has already been challenged, on the response.

Selling a transport business is not an ordinary share sale

The single biggest asset in a Peel trucking company is often not on the balance sheet. Operating authority, a safety rating and the commercial vehicle operator’s record attach to the operator rather than travelling automatically with a pile of assets, so whether a deal is structured as a share sale or an asset sale changes what the buyer actually receives. A buyer who purchases assets and assumes they have bought the authority to run them has a problem on the Monday after closing.

Equipment financing is the second complication. Tractors, trailers and yard equipment are usually subject to registrations under the Personal Property Security Act, sometimes several, sometimes stale ones nobody discharged. A search before closing is routine; reading what the searches actually disclose and clearing the ones that matter is the work.

Personal guarantees are the third. Owner-managers in this sector sign them routinely, for leases, for equipment, for fuel accounts, and they do not disappear when the company is sold. A share sale that does not deal with the guarantees leaves the departing owner exposed to a business they no longer control.

Where these matters are heard

Civil claims for Brampton businesses are issued in the Superior Court of Justice at the A. Grenville and William Davis Courthouse, 7755 Hurontario Street. Peel Region has one of the busier civil lists in Ontario, which is a practical reason to take mediation seriously rather than treat it as a formality on the way to a trial date.