The short answer
A QBCC licence should sit inside a company, not a trust. The reason is structural, not cosmetic — and it comes down to what the Commission asks you to put on the line when a trust is involved. Where a trust holds the licence, the QBCC commonly requires a deed of covenant and assurance to satisfy the financial requirements, and that assurance is almost always secured against the individual's personal assets. A company does not need it, because a company carries its own equity and stands behind the licence in its own right.
What a deed of covenant and assurance actually is
When the licence holder is a trust, the trust has no equity of its own — it only holds assets on behalf of beneficiaries under a deed. Because the trust cannot demonstrate financial position in its own name, the QBCC looks for another way to be satisfied that the financial requirements are met. That way is the deed of covenant and assurance.
In simple terms, an individual — usually the trustee or a person behind the trust — covenants to provide funds or support to the trust so the financial requirements can be met, and gives an assurance (a personal undertaking) backed by their own assets. The Commission is, in effect, asking a real person to stand behind a structure that cannot stand behind itself.
Why that puts the individual's assets on the line
The assurance is not a formality. It is secured against the individual's personal assets — the home, the savings, the guarantees already given. So at the exact moment the structure is supposed to protect the individual, the Commission's own requirement reaches through the trust and attaches to the person behind it.
Three problems follow:
-
The protection is illusory. The whole point of holding a licence in a structure is to put a wall between the business's liabilities and the individual's personal assets. A deed of covenant and assurance punches a hole in that wall before the licence is even granted.
-
Everything turns on the trust deed. A trust only exists by reference to its deed — distributions, powers, beneficiary rights, even the right to continue all flow from that document. Add a covenant and assurance on top, and the individual is personally exposed to a structure that depends on a deed being read correctly, kept current, and not silent on a key power.
-
The individual, not the structure, carries the risk. Because the trust has no equity, the financial burden falls on the person who signed the assurance. The licence is held by a trust, but the exposure is held by an individual.
Why a company avoids the problem
A company is a separate legal person. It owns its own assets, carries its own liabilities, and — critically — holds its own equity. When the licence sits in a company, the QBCC looks to the company's balance sheet to satisfy the financial requirements, not to a personal covenant behind it.
-
No deed of covenant and assurance needed. The company demonstrates financial position in its own name. There is no trust without equity, so there is no need to drag an individual's assets in to satisfy the Commission.
-
No deed dependency. A company operates under its constitution and the Corporations Act — a stable, well-understood framework. There is no trust deed to misread, no beneficiary class to manage, and no personal assurance to renew.
-
The wall holds. The company holds the licence, the contracts, and the operational risk. The director's home, savings, and personal guarantees sit behind the corporate wall — where they were always meant to be.
If you are not in the ideal structure
Plenty of licence holders start in a trust — often on generic advice — and only discover the problem when the QBCC asks for a deed of covenant and assurance and they realise their personal assets are now on the line. If that is you, the structure can be changed.
We restructure licence holders out of trusts and into companies regularly. The process is deliberate, not rushed: we confirm the new company, move the licence and contracts across cleanly, deal with the trust's remaining assets and distributions, and release the individual from the personal assurance where possible. The goal is a structure where the licence, the contracts, the assets, and the protection all sit in the same legal person — and the individual is no longer the collateral.
The one question to ask now
If your QBCC licence is held by a trust, ask yourself: what did you sign to satisfy the financial requirements — and what of yours is now secured against it? If the answer is a deed of covenant and assurance backed by your personal assets, it is time to talk about moving the licence into a company.
Call the direct line. We will walk through your current structure, confirm where the exposure sits, and plan the move into a company that holds the licence on its own feet — not on yours.
