Reference situation:

A liability limited company is going to build an e-commerce website, on which customers can purchase and sell goods through this platform. Sellers can publish their goods’ information on this website and buyers can search for products satisfying their needs. The Company requires legal consultancy about legal eligibility to operate this website.

Legal grounds:

1. Decree No. 52/2013/ND-CP by Government;
2. Circular No. 47/2014/TT-BCT by Ministry of Trade and Industry;
3. Circular No. 21/2018/TT-BCT by Ministry of Trade and Industry;

Our legal advice:

According to information that Your Company provides us with, Bizlawyer supposes that Your Company should pay attention to the following to operate Your Company’s target website:

1. Determination of the type of website

Article 25 of Decree No. 52/2013/ND-CP provides with as follows:

“1. An e-commerce trading website is a website established by trader, organization, individual by themselves to cater to trade promotion, goods sale, and service provision activities. 

2. A website providing e-commerce trading service is an e-commerce trading website establish by trader, organization, individual to provide an environment for other traders, organizations, and individuals to conduct commercial activities. A website providing e-commerce trading service is categorized as follows:

a) E-commerce trading exchange;

b) Online auction website;

c) Online promotion website;

d) Other types of website stipulated by the Ministry of Trading and Industry

In this situation, Your Company’s potential website is an e-commerce trading exchange (“sàn giao dịch thương mại điện tử”). Accordingly, Your Company needs to registering Your Company’s website at the Ministry of Trading and Industry.

2. Registration of e-commerce website

Registration documents include: 

• An application for registration of a website providing e-commerce trading service;
• A copy of Enterprise Registration Certificate certified as a true copy by a notary office or by a commune people’s committee.
• A scheme for providing e-commerce service on the website;
• A management regulation on the operation of the website;
• A form of a service contract or a cooperation agreement between Your Company with the traders, organizations, individuals who will trade and provide their service on the website.
• A list of general conditions applied for goods sale and service provision on the website (if any).

Time to get result: 15 working days from the date of filing valid documents.

Result: The Ministry of Trading and Industry will send Your Company, through Your Company’s email, a code that will be attached to Your Company’s website as an icon for a registered website.

During Your Company’s operation, Your Company needs to report the Ministry of Trading and Industry about Your Company’s operation statistics in the preceding year, before the 15th January each year.