From today, every UK company will require to have at least one director who is a natural person (although there will be a grace period of two years for any company that only had corporate directors on 8 November 2006). This means for most companies it will no longer be possible to continue to trade with only corporate directors.
A further change being introduced today is that all directors must be at least 16 years of age. This will bring English and Welsh registered companies into line with their Scottish counterparts which already have this minimum age requirement. Any underage directors will cease to be directors on 1 October 2008 and Companies House will automatically update the Register of Companies. It will be up to each company so affected to update its register of members.
If you think your company might be affected by one or both of these changes, we suggest reviewing your appointments as soon as possible. Companies in default of the new rules face receiving a direction from the Registrar of Companies to put matters right. Failure to comply with such a direction is a criminal offence for the company and its officers, and could result in a fine of up to £5,000 and a daily default fine of up to £500.
Other important changes introduced today (including the abolition of unlawful financial assistance for private companies and new rules on directors' conflict of interest) will be the subject of a separate e-update.
Disclaimer
The material contained in this article is of the nature of general comment only and does not give advice on any particular matter. Recipients should not act on the basis of the information in this e-update without taking appropriate professional advice upon their own particular circumstances.