Companies House identity verification, do it once and never think about it again

If you run a limited company you have probably had the email or the letter by now. Every director, and everyone who owns or controls a company, now verifies their identity with Companies House once, receives a personal code, and uses that code whenever a company they are part of files. It is a short job, it is free, and done at the right moment it is the last time you think about it. Done at the wrong moment it is the thing standing between your company and a filing it needs that week. Here is how we get it done, what it is worth to you, and where people get caught.

Why is this worth doing now rather than when the letter arrives

The rule came in on 18 November 2025, and Companies House is careful to say that date is not a deadline. It opened a twelve month transition in which every director and every person with significant control verifies by a due date of their own, set by the company’s confirmation statement or, for some shareholders, by their birth month. So nobody is late today. The question is whether you do it on your own terms or in the fourteen days before a filing.

Our view is that this is the rare piece of company administration that pays you back. The code is yours for life and works for every company you ever direct or control, so one quiet half hour covers the business you run today and the one you set up in five years, and every confirmation statement, appointment and new company from here on goes through first time with it on file. There is a quieter benefit too. Lenders, landlords and larger customers check the register before they deal with you, Companies House puts the value of that data at between £1 billion and £3 billion a year to the people who use it, and a register where every name is a verified person makes your own clean record worth more when someone looks it up.

What does it actually cost, and what do I need

Nothing, through GOV.UK One Login. Companies House says the service is free, and that an authorised agent, an accountant, solicitor or formation agent registered with it, may charge a fee for the same check. We do it with the people in the companies we look after as part of the service, in one sitting, because the alternative is chasing a code the week a filing is due.

You need a biometric passport from any country, a UK photo driving licence, full or provisional, or a UK biometric residence permit, residence card or Frontier Worker permit, plus your current address and the year you moved in. An expired passport cannot be used, a driving licence that expired within the last ninety days can, and a residence permit or card that expired within the last eighteen months can. Without suitable photo ID you can verify with your bank or building society details and National Insurance number, or at a Post Office after entering your document details online. Each person needs their own email address, because an address verifies one identity only, which catches two directors who share the office inbox.

Once verified you receive an eleven character personal code. It is personal to you, not to any company, you can share it with whoever files for you, and if it ever goes further than that Companies House issues a new one and cancels the old.

I am a director, when do I need my code by

If you were already a director on 18 November 2025 you provide your code as part of the company’s next confirmation statement, which is due within fourteen days of the end of its twelve month review period. The statement now asks for every director’s code, so a company whose directors have not verified cannot complete it. If you direct several companies you give the same code in each one’s statement. The statement costs £50 to file online since 1 February 2026, the fee you paid before verification existed.

Anyone appointed since 18 November 2025 gives the code with the appointment, and a new company cannot be formed until every director named on the application has one. That is the pattern we want for existing directors too. Verify in the week you join the register, and the confirmation statement date goes back to being the company’s annual check up rather than a deadline with a condition attached.

I own part of a company but I am not a director, what is different for me

A person with significant control, usually called a PSC, is anyone with more than twenty five percent of the shares or voting rights, anyone who can appoint or remove most of the board, and anyone who otherwise has significant influence over the company. Many owner managers are both a director and a PSC of the same company, and the rules treat the two roles separately, so one person provides the same code twice, once in the confirmation statement and once through the PSC verification service.

If you are a PSC and also a director, your PSC window is the fourteen days starting the day after the confirmation statement date, and filing the statement early does not move it. A statement date of 31 March gives a window of 1 April to 14 April. If you are a PSC but not a director, your window is the first fourteen days of your birth month, whatever the company has filed, so a birthday on 24 February gives 1 February to 14 February. Someone who became a PSC after 18 November 2025 provides the code when they are added or within fourteen days of it. The code can only go in once the window has opened, you can ask online for a fourteen day extension before it closes, and you can hand the code to the company or to us to provide for you.

A worked example, one founder, three companies

Take a founder who directs three companies, a trading company, a property company and a dormant one kept for the name, and owns all three. Their partner owns forty percent of the trading company, is not a director of it, and has a birthday on 9 May. The confirmation statement dates fall on 31 January, 30 June and 30 September.

Done our way the founder verifies once, at a cost of £0, and receives one code. The three statements are filed within fourteen days of their dates with that code in each, at £50 online apiece, £150 across the year and exactly what they cost before verification existed. The founder’s PSC windows run from 1 to 14 February, 1 to 14 July and 1 to 14 October, with the same code each time. The partner verifies once, also free, and provides their code between 1 and 14 May, and nothing the company files changes that. Total outlay for five roles across three companies, £150, all of it fees that were already due, and about an hour of two people’s time across a year.

Done the other way the founder starts on 10 February, the day the first statement is due, finds the date of birth on the register is a day out, and the trading company sits with an unfiled statement in the week its bank happens to run a review. Same money, same code, a very different fortnight.

Where people get caught

The failures we see are small and avoidable. The biggest is a mismatch. The name and date of birth linked to your code must match what Companies House holds, and a date of birth entered wrongly years ago has to be corrected through WebFiling before the code is accepted, so look at your own record on the register before you start. Then the misreadings. People assume the check is per company and brace for three, when it is per person and once. People assume paying someone is part of it, when the GOV.UK route is free and the only question is whether you would rather do it with us. Shareholders who are not directors assume the confirmation statement covers them, when their window is their own birth month. And companies file early to get ahead, which is fine, but it does not move the PSC window that follows the statement date.

If a due date does pass, Companies House writes first with a default letter and after that can impose a penalty, so the letter is the moment to verify rather than something to file away. In practice the cost of leaving it is rarely the penalty. It is the filing that will not go through on the day you need the record clean.

What we would do in your position

Stated as a rule, because it is one we apply. Every director and every PSC verifies in the week they join the register, or this month if they are already on it. The codes sit in the company file beside the authentication code and the registered email. The confirmation statement date is diarised with the fourteen day PSC window that follows it, every shareholder with control who is not a director has their birth month diarised separately, and nobody looks for a passport in a hurry again.

How we help

For the companies we look after we verify every director and PSC with them as their authorised agent, keep each personal code on file and put the right code in the right filing on the right day, including the confirmation statement itself. If you would like us to check the dates for your company and get everyone verified in one sitting, book a free thirty minute call.

This article is general information, not personal advice, and tax rules change over time. For guidance on your own circumstances, get in touch.

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