Companies House - Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.

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Coordinates: 51.4994°N 3.1895°W

Companies House
Companies House is the United Kingdom's registrar of companies and is an executive
agency and trading fund of Her Majesty's Government. It falls under the remit of the Companies House
Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) and is also a member of
the Public Data Group. All forms of companies (as permitted by the United Kingdom
Companies Act) are incorporated and registered with Companies House and file specific
details as required by the current Companies Act 2006. All registered limited companies,
including subsidiary, small and inactive companies, must file annual financial statements Executive agency overview
in addition to annual company returns, which are all public records. Only some registered Jurisdiction United Kingdom
unlimited companies (meeting certain conditions) are exempt from this requirement.
Headquarters Crown Way
The United Kingdom has had a system of company registration since 1844. The legislation Cardiff
governing company registration matters is the Companies Act 2006. CF14 3UZ[1]
Executive Louise Smyth,
agency Chief Executive
Contents executives and Registrar of
Companies for
History England and Wales
Response to 2020 pandemic
Lisa Davis,
England and Wales Registrar of
Scotland Companies for
Scotland
Northern Ireland
Helen Shilliday,
Types of companies
Registrar of
Register of company directors Companies for
Controversy Northern Ireland
See also Parent Department for
References department Business, Energy
and Industrial
External links
Strategy
Website www.gov.uk
History /government
/organisations
The Joint Stock Companies Act 1844 permitted the incorporation of joint-stock companies, /companies-house
previously only possible by the mechanisms of royal charter or private act, which had (https://www.gov.uk
meant few companies were formed. The act required that all companies formed under it /government/organi
were recorded on a public register, and created the office of Registrar of Joint Stock sations/companies-
Companies to be responsible for maintaining the register. house)

Company registration in Scotland commenced in 1856, with the first company registered
being 'The Daily Bulletin Limited'. The first Registrar of Joint Stock Companies for Scotland was George Deane, from 1856 to
1858, before he was transferred to the London office of Companies House to be Chief Clerk to the Registrar for England and
Wales. The remaining staff were transferred to the office of the Queen's and Lord Treasurer's Remembrancer (Q&LTR), who
took on the role of Registrar of Companies for Scotland.

In 1982 the post of Q&LTR was transferred to the Crown Agent, and the staff and functions relating to company registration in
Scotland were transferred to the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) on 1 April 1981.

In October 1988, Companies House became an executive agency of the Department of Trade and Industry, and then in October
1991 started to operate as a trading fund, self-financing by retaining income from charges.

Companies House is also responsible for dissolving companies.[2]

In 2020, there were approximately 4.3 million businesses on the Companies House register.[3]

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Response to 2020 pandemic

In view of the coronavirus pandemic, from 25 March 2020 companies were able to apply for a three-month extension to the
annual deadline for filing their accounts and reports.[3]

England and Wales

England and Wales are treated as a single jurisdiction (companies may be ‘Registered in England and Wales’) with a unified
register, separate from those of Scotland or Northern Ireland. Companies must advise Companies House of their intended
registered office (the official address of the company), which may be in England and Wales, in Scotland, or in Wales.[4]
Consequently, on incorporation, companies will be either 'Registered in England and Wales', 'Registered in Scotland', or
'Registered in Wales'. Effectively, companies in England must register in England and Wales, companies in Scotland must
register in Scotland, while companies in Wales may choose to register in either England and Wales, or in Wales.

Although their legal registration is in either England and Wales, or in Wales, according to Companies House companies must
display the company registered office location in a manner similar to one of the following suggested formats:

“On all company’s business letters, order forms (in hard copy, electronic or any other form) and its websites, the
company must show in legible lettering:

(a) the part of the United Kingdom in which the company is registered which is:

For Companies registered in England and Wales either:

Registered in England and Wales; or

Registered in England; or
Registered in Wales; or
Registered in London; or
Registered in Cardiff.”

The Companies House office in Cardiff handles companies incorporated in England and
Wales.[4] These companies are subject to English law. Until 2011 there was another office at
Nantgarw, Wales. The London office at Petty France is purely a facility to file and view
documents, which are then processed in Cardiff.

The Registrar of Companies for England and Wales is the Chief Executive Louise Smyth.
The role of Chief Registrar is not a political one and the incumbent is a civil servant.

All companies registered in England and Wales have 8-digit registration numbers.
The Cardiff office

Scotland
The Edinburgh office handles companies incorporated in Scotland. These companies are subject to Scots law. Scottish company
registration numbers are prefixed by the letters SC.

Northern Ireland
The Companies Act 2006 was fully implemented on 1 October 2009 and the Northern Ireland companies register was fully
integrated into Companies House. Companies House maintains a satellite office in Belfast, headed by the Registrar of
Companies for Northern Ireland.

Before 1 October 2009 all limited companies in Northern Ireland were registered with the Department of Enterprise, Trade and
Investment and were subject to Northern Ireland law.

Types of companies
The many types of companies include:

Public limited company (PLC)

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Private company limited by shares (Ltd, Limited)

Private company limited by guarantee, typically a non-commercial membership body which may, or may not, be charitable
(Ltd, Limited)
Private unlimited company (either with or without a share capital)
Limited liability partnership (LLP)
Limited partnership (LP)
Societas Europaea (SE): European Union-wide company structure
Companies incorporated by Royal Charter (RC)
Community interest company (CIC): usually a standard limited company but regardless of the company's articles it must
reinvest any and all profit
Charitable incorporated organisation (CIO): a charity with limited liability

Register of company directors

All companies are required to appoint one or more directors (the minimum number is dependent upon the company type) and
generally it is up to the members to appoint the people they believe will run the company well on their behalf. The only
restrictions that prevent anyone becoming a director are they must be at least 16 and:

they must not have been disqualified from acting as a company director, under the Company Directors Disqualification Act
1986 (unless the court has given them permission to act for a particular company);
they must not be an undischarged bankrupt (unless they have been given permission by the court to act for a particular
company).

Controversy
In February 2008, The Times[5] and Computer Weekly[6] broke a story that almost 4,000 of the names on the Companies
House register of directors were on international watchlists of alleged fraudsters, money launderers, terror financiers and
corrupt officials. The results came from Datanomic who had screened the 6.8 million names on the register against a World-
Check database of high risk individuals and businesses. The exercise also revealed more than 1,500 disqualified company
directors were being allowed to run other UK companies as Companies House was not checking names against its register of
disqualified persons.

See also
List of company registers

References
1. "Companies House" (https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/companies-house). gov.uk. Retrieved 17 January 2020.
2. "Glossary of Useful Terms" (https://baileyahmad.co.uk/business/glossary/). Bailey Ahmad. Retrieved 18 November 2014.
3. "Companies to receive 3-month extension period to file accounts during COVID-19" (https://www.gov.uk/government/news/
companies-to-receive-3-month-extension-period-to-file-accounts-during-covid-19). GOV.UK. 25 March 2020. Retrieved
25 March 2020.
4. "Company Formation GBF1" (https://web.archive.org/web/20081012111500/http://www.companieshouse.gov.uk/about/gbht
ml/gbf1.shtml). Companies House website. Companies House. 2003. Archived from the original (http://www.companieshou
se.gov.uk/about/gbhtml/gbf1.shtml) on 12 October 2008. Retrieved 10 October 2008.
5. "The Times: 4,000 company directors listed as global terror suspects and fraudsters" (http://www.world-check.com/media/d/
content_pressarticle_reference/Times_CompaniesHouse_0802.pdf) (PDF).
6. "UK Companies House register contains 3,994 high-risk individuals, Datanomic finds" (http://www.computerweekly.com/Arti
cles/2008/02/21/229520/uk-companies-house-register-contains-3994-high-risk-individuals-datanomic.htm).

External links
Official website (https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/companies-house)
Companies House (https://twitter.com/CompaniesHouse) on Twitter
Companies House (https://www.facebook.com/CompaniesHouse) on Facebook

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Companies House WebCheck (https://www.registeredaddress.co.uk/blog/companies-house-webcheck-and-how-to-use-it/)

How To Use Companies House WebCheck

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