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Prerequisites
Type and size of organisation
To become an incorporated association, your club, community group or organisation must:
- not operate for profit
- have at least five members.
Name
Your proposed name must not be:
To find out if your proposed name can be registered, you must lodge an application. The fee is fully refundable if your application is unsuccessful.
You cannot use the above registers to confirm the availability of a name for registration. There might be other restrictions that affect your application.
Statement of purposes
Your association must have a written statement of purposes that describes, in numbered paragraphs, what the association hopes to achieve.
An example of a statement of purposes:
- To provide an opportunity for the youth of our area to participate in Australian Rules Football and enhance their health and wellbeing through organised sport.
- To provide for the health, welfare and wellbeing of players, supporters and spectators.
Rules
Your association must have a written set of rules, also known as a constitution, that deals with the matters set out in the Schedule to the Associations Incorporation Act 1981(the Act).
We provide a set of model rules that may save your association the time and expense of drafting rules from scratch. Your association can either:
- adopt the model rules
- modify the model rules to suit its requirements
- draft its own rules.
Download our
Model rules for an incorporated association (Word, 110KB).
Tax requirements
If your association is seeking exemption from income tax, you might need to add specific clauses to the association’s rules to meet Australian Taxation Office requirements. Before you incorporate, check the Australian Taxation Office website.
Australian Business Number (ABN)
Your association is not required to have an ABN but it might need one for tax purposes. Check the Australian Business Register website.
Limited liability insurance
There is no requirement in the Act for incorporated associations to have limited liability insurance. Seek legal advice about what insurance your association needs.
Vote to incorporate the association
In order to incorporate, the association must hold a meeting to vote on whether to do so. All members must be given at least 21 days notice of the meeting.
At this meeting, a majority of votes cast by members, whether personally or by proxy if proxies are allowed, must:
- authorise a person, who is at least 18 years old and resides in Victoria, to incorporate the association
- approve a proposed statement of purposes
- approve proposed rules that comply with the Act or approve the adoption of the model rules.
The person who lodges the application for incorporation becomes the first public officer of the incorporated association, unless another public officer has been nominated. The committee members of the unincorporated association form the first management committee of the incorporated association, unless the rules specify otherwise.
For more information about the roles of the public officer and management committee, view our Responsibilities of an incorporated association section.
Lodge an application form
The person authorised to apply for incorporation must complete and lodge:
Cheques must be made payable to Consumer Affairs Victoria. Receipts will only be issued on request.
We will issue a certificate of incorporation after the application has been accepted, showing the name of the incorporated association, registration number and date of incorporation.
Last updated: 15/05/2012