Is your company’s registered office address “appropriate”? New rules
05 September 2024
If your business is a company, you need to know that there are now new rules for registered office addresses which mean companies must, at all times, have an ‘appropriate address’ as their registered office.
An address is an ‘appropriate address’ if, in the ordinary course of events:
- a document addressed to the company, and delivered there by hand or by post, would be expected to come to the attention of a person acting on behalf of the company;
- the delivery of documents there is capable of being recorded by the obtaining of an acknowledgement of delivery.
If the company’s registered office address does not meet these requirements, this means the address is not appropriate. It is important to get this right, as Companies House (Companies House is an executive agency of the Department for Business and Trade. It holds the UK’s register of companies and the Register of Overseas Entities) may take action against the company and its officers as they’re committing an offence.
If Companies House decides a company’s registered office is not appropriate, it will change the registered office address to a default address, held at Companies House. If a company’s registered office is moved to the default address, they must provide an appropriate address with evidence of proprietary ownership within 28 days, or else Companies House may start the process to strike the company off the register of companies.
Businesses using an agent’s address or another third-party provider’s address as their registered office must make sure the address service they provide meets the requirements for an appropriate registered office address.
Companies can no longer use a Royal Mail PO Box, or equivalent services offered by other parties, as their registered office address.
At Backhouse Jones, we have a team who can help you with company secretarial matters, so please get in touch with us here for more information.
This article was written by Jo Dawson-Gerrard.
