Protection of directors' residential addresses: amendment to Disclosure of Address Regulations 2009
On 26 April 2018, the Companies (Disclosure of Address) (Amendment) Regulations 2018 came into force (the Regulations). The Regulations make it easier for a director to remove their personal residential address from the public register at Companies House.
Background
Under the Companies Act 2006 (from 01 October 2009), all directors’ residential addresses are kept confidential by Companies House. A director must provide the Registrar of Companies with both a service address and a usual residential address, but only the service address will be available to the public. A director’s usual residential address will be “protected information” and, as a general rule, will only be disclosed to certain public authorities and credit reference agencies in specified circumstances.
Prior to 01 October 2009, the general position was that a director’s usual residential address was publicly available at Companies House, unless a confidentiality order had been granted. Despite the changes made by the Companies Act 2006, any directors’ residential addresses filed with the Registrar before 01 October 2009 remain publicly available. In order to remove these residential addresses from the public record, a successful application had to be made to the Registrar under the Companies (Disclosure of Address) Regulations 2009 (the 2009 Regulations.) The 2009 Regulations only allowed the Registrar to make this residential information unavailable for public inspection if:
- the information was filed on or after 01 January 2003, and
- the Registrar was satisfied that the activities of the company were such that continuing to make the address publicly available would lead to a serious risk of violence or intimidation for those at the address.
A company could also apply under the 2009 Regulations for the suppression of residential address information of all its members. Again, the “serious risk of violence or intimidation” test had to be satisfied if the application was to be successful.
Amendments to the 2009 Regulations
The Regulations were made on 25 April 2018 and came into force on 26 April 2018 (having previously been published in draft on 22 February 2018). They amend the 2009 Regulations to make it easier for directors to remove any personal residential address information that may still be publicly available at Companies House. Under the amendments made by the Regulations:
- a director can apply for usual residential address information at Companies House to be made unavailable for public inspection without having to make the application on any specified grounds (meaning that the “serious risk of violence or intimidation” test no longer applies), and
- an application to remove residential address information that was filed before 01 January 2003 will now be permitted.
Individuals who are required to maintain a current address at Companies House (eg directors of live companies) will have to provide the Registrar with a service address which will be publicly available in place of their home address. Individuals who are not subject to this requirement (eg former directors) will not need to provide a service address. Instead, their residential address will be partially suppressed to show only the first half of their postcode.
The “serious risk of violence or intimidation” test is being retained in relation to applications by a company for the suppression of residential address information of all its members. However, the restriction on applications being made in relation to information placed on the register before 01 January 2003 has been removed. Also, an individual member will be able to make an application for suppression of their residential address without having to satisfy the “serious risk of violence or intimidation test”, in the same way as an individual director.
The 2018 Regulations also make similar amendments to the Limited Liability Partnerships (Application of Companies Act 2006) Regulations 2009.
