Offences and fines under Companies Act 2006 apply to company registered with Companies House in the United Kingdom.
Companies House would impose fines or imprisonment or both if your company is guilty of an offence. For example, your company failed to deliver confirmation statement to Companies House. It is a criminal offence.
Company fines based on the standard scale fine
The fines follow the standard scale of fines of the Criminal Justice Act 1982. It is often being referred to as “the standard scale”.
The standard scale of fines for summary offences are detailed below.
| Level on the scale | Amount of fine |
| 1 | £200 |
| 2 | £500 |
| 3 | £1,000 |
| 4 | £2,500 |
| 5 | £5,000 |
Overall, failure to comply and maintain your company records according to Companies Act 2006 requirements would result of your company and your director, secretary, manager and officers in default. Thus liable to company fines.
Company records
Your company records include the following:
- Confirmation statements
- Minutes of meetings
- Register of directors
- Directors’ home address register
- Register of secretaries
- Members (shareholders) register
- Person with Significance Control (PSC) register
- Registers of Charges
- Register of debenture holders
- Register of interests in PLC shares
- and any other document your company must keep as required by the Companies Act 2006.
Companies House send reminders to your company registered office when your company filing become due. So, it is important you act on the reminders promptly.
On the other hand, if you no longer have access to mails sent to your registered office, complete and send the form AD01 to Companies House update it.
Generally, Companies House would not accept PO BOX address as a valid registered office address. Thus, your address must be a physical address. However, if you do not have a suitable address to use as your registered office, you may use an address service provider for a fee. The service provider would then forward your letters they received to your home address or anyway in the world. On the other hand, you must provide proof of identity and proof of address documents to satisfy their due diligence check.
