In this blog we will look at the proposed new legislation for registered office addresses.

All companies must register with Companies House. On incorporation the company becomes Limited

All information provided by new companies must be verified by Companies House.  Legislation including new legislation for registered offices is being introduced in March.  This legislation is intended to give Companies House more powers when incorporating companies.

But what is Companies House?

Companies House Responsibilities

Companies House is responsible for all companies in the UK.  Companies House is an executive agency of the Department for Business and Trade in the UK.  It has offices in London, Cardiff,  Edinburgh and Belfast.

Companies House is responsible for

• incorporating and dissolving limited companies
• examine and store company information
• making company information information available to the public

When will the new legislation be introduced?

New legislation for incorporated companies will be introduced on 4 March 2024. All companies will have to adhere to the new legislation  Anyone thinking of incorporating their company, needs to keep abreast of these new regulations.

What are the new legislative changes

There are 3 major changes that Companies House will be introducing

1. Appropriate Address
2. Registered Email Address
3. Statement of Lawful Purpose

We will look at each of these changes individually and assess how they will affect new companies and existing companies on the Companies House Register.

Appropriate Address

From 4 March 2024 companies must register their offices at “an appropriate address”

An appropriate address has been described by Companies House 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

This prohibits the use of PO boxes as a registered office address.  Companies that currently use PO boxes as their registered office address must change their address to “an appropriate address” before the 4 March 2024.  Failure to do so will result in their company being struck off the register.

Company Email

Companies must now provide a registered company email to Companies House.  This will be required for new companies as well as for companies that are currently on the register.  The company email must be appropriate for Companies House to use to communicate with the incorporated company.  Companies House will not make the company email public.  For existing companies, they will be able to provide a suitable or appropriate email to Companies House when the next provide a Confirmation Statement from 4 March 2024.  Again, any company that fails to provide a registered email address will be committing an offence.

Statement of lawful purpose

From 4 March 2024 all shareholders within a company must confirm that they are setting up their company for lawful purposes.  This is to ensure that all companies on the register are committed to carrying out their company activities in a lawful manner and within the law. Where Companies House is given information that a Company is carrying out illegal activities, Companies House will investigate.  If the company is deemed to be carrying out unlawful activities they may be subject to further action. The company may be struck of he register.  Existing companies will be able to include their “Statement of Lawful Purpose” on their next Confirmation Statement on or after 4 March 2024

Why Have These Changes Been Introduced?

From 4 March 2024, Companies House will now have more power to query applications to the register.  They will be able to ask applicants for further docevidence. and they will have more power to reject companies that do not provide appropriate evidence for incorporation.  These increased powers will allow the register to be “cleaned up”.  The increased powers allow Companies House to annotate the register in relation to misleading or confusing material.  In addition the new legislation allows Companies House to question Company Names if they feel that the name has been used by a company previously or if they feel that the name is inappropriate.

How Lets Letterbox Can Help

Businesses that wish to become incorporated in Northern Ireland can be assured that Lets Letterbox provides an appropriate registered address for their company.  Based in Belfast we provide registered office address services for UK customers  UK Customer Services and for customers outside of the UK Overseas Limited Company Services.

Lets Letterbox is supervised by HMRC and we carryout a comprehensive check on all our clients   We carryout AML and KYC checks on every individual that uses our services.  Clients must provide photographic ID , proof of address and complete an application form when they sign up with Lets Letterbox.

You can access our UK application form here UK Application Form

Overseas clients can access our application form here Overseas Application Form

For a comprehensive list of our Terms and Conditions, just click  Lets Letterbox Terms & Conditions 

More information on the new legislation can be found on the Companies House blog Companies House Blog