Directors have ten weeks left to verify their identity
The Companies House transition year ends on 18 November. Every director and every person with significant control must verify by their own due date. Miss it and you commit an offence, face a financial penalty, and cannot file anything for your company.
Identity verification at Companies House became a legal requirement on 18 November 2025. The same date opened a transition year so that everyone could get through it. That year ends on 18 November 2026 — ten weeks from now.
If you have a UK limited company — however small, however dormant, even one where you are the sole director and the only employee — this is about you.
Who it covers
- Directors — all of them, including those who registered years ago and have changed nothing since.
- People with significant control (PSCs) — anyone holding more than 25% of the shares, more than a quarter of the votes, or otherwise controlling the company.
- People who file documents for a company — but that requirement comes later, on its own date.
If you are both a director and a PSC, you verify once but supply the code twice — separately for each role.
When your date falls
There is no single day for everybody: each person has their own date, tied either to the company or to their birth month.
| Who you are | When to supply the code |
|---|---|
| Director | with the company's next confirmation statement |
| Director and PSC | separately for each role, within 14 days of the confirmation statement date |
| PSC only | in the first 14 days of your birth month |
| Became a PSC after 18 November 2025 | on first entry in the register, or within 14 days |
| New company | at incorporation |
The simplest check is your company's own record on the register: find the next confirmation statement date and work back from it. There is no reason to wait for November.
How to verify
Through GOV.UK One Login — free. This is the main route. You create a One Login, answer some questions, then confirm your identity through the app with a photo of your document, through questions about your credit history, or in person at a Post Office if the app will not play. British citizenship is not required — a foreign passport works.
Through an Authorised Corporate Service Provider (ACSP) — an accountant, solicitor or formation agent. They check you against an approved list of documents. It is a legitimate route, but a paid one: each provider sets its own price.
Once verified you get a Companies House personal code. It belongs to you, not to the company: it stays with you when you move between companies and is needed each time you are appointed a director. Keep it like a password and never forward it.
What happens if you miss it
The government's own wording is blunt: failing to verify on time is an offence. The consequences listed alongside it are a financial penalty, an inability to make filings for your company, and an inability to start a new one.
For a trading business the second bites harder than the first. Blocked filings mean a late confirmation statement, late accounts and, further down the chain, the risk of the company being struck off the register.
What to do today
One Login takes about fifteen minutes and costs nothing. A sensible order: do it yourself, then ask your co-director and everyone holding more than a quarter of the company to do the same, and collect their codes in advance — so that filing day does not arrive with a partner on holiday and no passport to hand.
Start from "Verify your identity for Companies House" on GOV.UK — linked in the sources below.
We do not give individual legal or accounting advice. If your ownership structure is unusual — a company or a trust holding the shares, say — check the order of play with your accountant: rules for corporate directors are being introduced separately and later.
