Changes to UK company law – how it will affect companies and entities

The Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Act became law in October 2023 so there will be changes being made at Companies House following this.  The first set of changes are aiming to be in place on 4 March 2024.

The three early changes will be:

1. Requirement to use an “appropriate address” as a registered office
2. Duty to provide a registered email address
3. New statement of lawful purpose

What these changes mean?

Requirement to use an appropriate address as a registered office

• Documents sent to the registered address need to be received by a person acting on behalf of the company.
• Documents sent the address can be recorded by acknowledgement of delivery.
• No PO box addresses can be used from 4 March.
• If no appropriate address is registered, then the company could be struck off.

Duty to provide a registered email address

All companies will need to provide a registered email address.  These will not be published on the public register.

Companies will have a duty to keep the email address up to date, like the registered address.  Any company that does not keep this up to date will be committing an offence.

New statement of lawful purpose

Any company incorporated from 4 March will need to confirm that the company being formed is for lawful purpose.

On the Confirmation Statement (form CS01) which needs to be filed annually with Companies House, you will also need to confirm that the company’s intended future activities are lawful.  If the statement is not received, then the documents received by Companies House will not be accepted.

Companies House are also changing their fees on 1 May 2024 as follows:

All other Companies House fees from 1 May 2024 can be found here.