Question to the Department for Business and Trade:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, what assessment he has made of the adequacy of Companies House address verification procedures in preventing overseas entities from registering UK companies at virtual office addresses, residential properties, or addresses used by large numbers of unconnected companies.

Companies House is continuously improving its ability to detect and prevent the misuse of addresses on the companies register.

The Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Act 2023 enhanced the Registrar’s powers to query and challenge addresses before they are registered and streamlined and strengthened powers to change and remove inappropriate addresses from the register.

Reports on this activity are provided to Parliament each year. The latest report is available here:

Second progress report on the implementation and operation of Parts 1 to 3 of Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Act 2023