Our firm has assisted various volunteers to set up charitable organisations, including churches, non-government organizations (NGOs) and volunteer groups, and assisted these organisations to apply for tax exemption under Section 88 of the Inland Revenue Ordinance.
To register a Company Limited by Guarantee and apply for tax exemption, the general procedure is to draft an Articles of Association as well as a activity plan for the first year for approval by the Inland Revenue Department (IRD), who will make inquiries on the contents and request for amendments, which may be made more than once. Upon approval by the Inland Revenue Department, the relevant documents can be submitted to the Companies Registry for incorporation. According to our experience, the whole process takes about 9 to 12 months.
If you want to set up a company as soon as possible (or if the company has already been set up), you can set up the company first and then apply for tax exemption, but the approval time will be longer.
