Companies House: Prescriptive Requirements For Addresses
The start of this month saw the introduction of tighter rules for registrations at Companies House, meaning that businesses need to ensure correct and up-to-date information is filed within required time limits.
Last month we highlighted the upcoming reforms under the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Act 2023, which includes landmark changes to the Companies Act 2006. Those changes include imposing more stringent requirements on the contact details of directors to be registered at Companies House.
Registered offices
All registered offices, including those already registered, must be a genuine and ‘appropriate’ office address. PO Box addresses are no longer acceptable but an agent’s address, eg accountants, can be used if it is an ‘appropriate’ address.
Companies House defines an appropriate address as one where:
· any documents sent to the registered office should be expected to come to the attention of a person acting on behalf of the company
· any documents sent to that address can be recorded by an acknowledgement of delivery
Invalid addresses will be removed, including those used fraudulently, and Companies House will ask that an appropriate registered address is filed (this should have been supplied, in any event, by 4 March). Any company that had a PO Box address and has not yet complied could be struck off the register if they fail to provide an appropriate address when required.
Note that the requirements apply to all companies, including those that are dormant or not currently trading.
Email addresses
New and existing companies must also provide an ‘appropriate’ registered email address, but directors can be reassured that this information will not be made publicly available. By now, companies may already have been contacted by Companies House to confirm that a registered email address is still correct.
Companies House defines an ‘appropriate email address’ as “one at which, in the ordinary course of events, emails sent to it by the registrar would be expected to come to the attention of a person acting on behalf of the company”.
CH has confirmed that an agent can provide a registered email address on behalf of a company.
If email addresses change, you can update it easily online with the correct authentication. This is important: any company that does not do this may well be committing an offence.
Bear in mind that directors must expect that many of their registered details will be publicly accessible (except, eg email addresses). Companies House has a statutory duty to collect it and make it available. The register is, of course, public and anyone who wishes to can search and obtain information from it.
The companies registrar now has greater powers to query and challenge information that appears to be incorrect or inconsistent.
We urge all companies to review their contact details and addresses filed at Companies House in light of the new rules.
If you would like us to cover an issue in the next NGM Tax Law Newsletter, we would be pleased to hear from you