Companies House – Update on reforms and new fees announced

Following on from our previous article on the planned reforms from the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Act, we can now confirm further details as follows:

• From 4 March, the Registrar will have new powers to scrutinise, query and reject filings. We may experience delays in making changes for our statutory clients – with filings no longer being automatically accepted
• From 4 March, all incorporation requests (IN01 forms) will need to include:

• • A registered email address – that can be used for the receipt of all notices from Companies House relating to the company. The email address will not be on the public records. It should an address that is monitored regularly for updates and specific enquiries from Companies House, particularly as some messages may require a swift response. There may be consequences for not responding to email enquiries, ranging from financial penalties, annotations to the register or prosecution. We will be making an email address available to our statutory clients should they wish to use it.
  • A ‘lawful purpose statement’ – where the subscribers confirm that the company is being formed for lawful purposes
• From 5 March onwards, Confirmation Statements (CS01s) will be in a new format to include the above two new items – we will confirm details with our statutory clients when we issue their next CS01
• From 4 March, companies will no longer be able to have a PO Box as their registered office address
• Latest indications suggest that the Identity Checks will be introduced sometime between Autumn 24 and Spring 25. We will provide further updates going forward.

Companies House have now published their new fees that will come into effect on 1 May. These are in summary:

A full list of the new fees, together with more details on the Companies House reforms can be viewed here.