Every rule your trade answers to.
Watched, in one place.
NSW Fair Trading, SafeWork, Fair Work, your insurer, and the client sitting on your payment schedule — one trade business answers to all of them at once. Nothing watches all of it. We're building the thing that does.
What a trade business is actually juggling
- Contractor licence for the actual work you're doing — any residential job over $5,000 in labour and materials needs one, and general building, electrical, plumbing, gasfitting and tiling each have their own licence class. Unlicensed work above that threshold is a $22,000 fine for an individual, $110,000 for a company.
- Home Building Compensation cover before you take a deposit — required on any residential job over $20,000, with at least $340,000 of cover already in place. Taking money first and sorting the paperwork later is the exact mistake that catches people out.
- SWMS before high-risk work starts — work at height, near mobile plant, in a trench over 1.5m, near live services, or on/near a road all need a site-specific Safe Work Method Statement prepared in advance, not written up after the fact.
- Award wage classification — the Building and Construction Award is one of the most allowance-heavy in the system: tool allowance, travel, RDOs and site/weather conditions stack on top of the trade rate. Paying just the base rate you remember from last year is a genuine underpayment, not a rounding error.
- Payment claims run on a legal clock — a subcontractor's payment claim falls due 20 business days after it's served, and a client who doesn't respond with a payment schedule within 10 business days becomes liable for the full amount regardless of merit. Most people only learn this clock exists after they've missed it.
- Subcontractor credentials — licence, insurance and ABN currency for every subcontractor on your job, not just yourself.
The dates that end businesses
A lapsed HBC cover or contractor licence doesn't just risk a fine — it can void your ability to legally take payment on a job already underway. A missed payment schedule deadline makes you liable for the full claimed amount, whether or not the claim was fair. One job, several clocks, no system — that's the actual problem.
What Komiti does about it
Ask and check
- Business Q&A — cited answers on licensing, SWMS, hiring, GST
- Setup checklist — starting a trade business, step by step
- Payday Super check — the super rules changed 1 July
The trade brain
- Every date watched: licence renewal, HBC cover, insurance currency
- SWMS builder for high-risk work, ready before the job starts
- Payment claim tracker — the 20/10 business-day clock, on both sides
- Subcontractor register — licence, insurance and ABN currency in one place
- Document vault — licences, certificates, SWMS, one search away from an inspector or a client dispute
- Change alerts — award rates, licensing rules, filtered to your trade
Founding trades
We're building this with a small number of trade businesses, not for an imaginary average one. Founding trades get it shaped around how they actually run — and founding pricing locked for the first year. No card, no commitment; you'll hear from Peter directly.