Annual Returns
An Annual Return is a return you have to complete and submit to Companies House every year. There is a filing fee to pay to Companies House when the Return is submitted. If you submit the return by post the fee is £30, and payable by cheque. If you submit the form online the fee is £15, payable by credit card.
The Annual Return confirms the Registered Office address of the company, the names of Directors, the name of the Company Secretary, and the name of the Shareholders of the company and their Shareholdings and the addresses of each of these.
I have an account with Companies House to make payment of the fee quick and easy and will complete and submit your Annual Return free of charge. However I require reimbursement of the online filing fee of £15 before submitting the return.
Before the Annual Return is due, Companies House will send you a reminder that it is due. When you receive the reminder you forward it to me, together with a cheque for £15 payable to "John Pointon". When I have received the filing fee I will complete and submit the Annual Return. Receipt of your payment will act as my authority to complete and submit the Annual Return on your behalf.
The Annual Return is an important document. Failure to submit the Return will result in Companies House
taking action to close your company and strike it from the company register.
Your Annual Return date is the anniversary of the date your company was formed.
Directors Home/Service Address
From 1st October 2009 Companies House are changing the way Directors home addresses are stored.
At present Companies House keep only one address for each Director, their usual residential home address.
Any person performing a search on a company can therefore obtain a Director's home address. This is neither safe nor private. Therefore from 01 October 2009 Companies House will allow every Director to nominate a service address as their address on public view.
The service address will be public information, and the residential address will become protected information. A Director can choose any address as the service address including the Registered Office address of the company.
The address must be where documents can be delivered if required. The address can not be a PO Box or a DX number.
If the Director chooses to use his residential address as the service address the fact that the two addresses are the same would not be apparent from the public record.
The residential address will only be available to prescribed regulatory authorities such as the police and HMRC, and it may also be made available to Credit Reference Agencies.
I believe this is a positive move and advise clients to nominate a service address which is not their home address.
The only issue to overcome is that from 01 October 2009 the service address will automatically be the residential address. Therefore you will have to submit your chosen service address to Companies House for them to make the change.
I can make the change for you for a fee of £15 per company. If you are a Director of more than one company the fee will be £15 per company.
Should you use my office address this will not affect the address to which your customers and suppliers send invoices and payments. The only official body which sends correspondence to your Registered Office address is Companies House.
Submission Date for Annual Accounts
Companies House have reduced the submission deadline for limited company accounts from 10 months after the year end date to 9 months after the year end date.
Failure to submit the accounts by the due date will result in the company receiving a late filing penalty from Companies House.
Such penalties start at £150 but rapidly increase the longer after the due date the accounts are submitted. If you submit accounts late for two years running the penalty will be doubled.
To ensure your accounts are submitted before the due date it is important to ensure you allow enough time
to prepare them.
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