Companies House Information Charter

We need to handle personal information about you so that we can provide services for you and the public. This is how we look after that information.

The main functions of Companies House are to:

• incorporate and dissolve limited companies
• examine and store company information under the Companies Act and related legislation; and
• make this information available to the public

Companies House also carries out delegated functions for the Secretary of State, for example, enforcing the delivery of annual accounts and annual returns; directing companies to change their names that are similar to those currently on the public record, etc.

In the course of maintaining and administering the public register we will hold personal information about individuals that will fall into the categories of public and non-public data.

Non Public data

When we ask you for personal information, we promise:

• To make sure you know why we need it
• To only ask for what we need, and not to collect too much or irrelevant information
• To protect it and make sure nobody has access to it who shouldn’t
• To make sure we don’t keep it any longer that necessary

In return, we ask you to:

• give us accurate information; and
• tell us as soon as possible if there are any changes

Public Data

• We only ask for information that is required by legislation
• We will put this information on the public record and make it available to anyone who wants to look at it.

You can get more details on:

• how to find out what information we hold about you 
• the circumstances where we can pass on your personal information without telling you, for example: to prevent and detect crime or to produce anonymised statistics;
  
  from the Information Rights Team email: informationrights@companieshouse.gov.uk

• how to make a complaint
  
  from Customer Services email: walters@companieshouse.gov.uk

Fax: 01625 524510

Website: www.ico.gov.uk