Things you must do when you just bought a ready made company from a company formation agent. A ready made company is a limited company incorporated by company formation agents for sale. Generally, people buy a ready made company because they either like the company name or the age of the company.
Preliminary check
Go to Companies House website to check the filing history of the ready-made company you would like to buy. To ensure that the company’s filing is up to date with Companies House and it has never traded since it’s incorporation.
Transfer company ownership and control
Usually, after you bought your ready made company, the company formation agent will transfer the company’s ownership and control to you. They would carry out the following to transfer the company’s ownership and control to you.
Appoint your director and company secretary
Generally, the company formation agent would ask you to provide details of at least one company director to them for your ready made company. They would submit the form AP01 to add a new director to your company. If the new director is you, after the appointment, you would be legally responsible for the company.
Thereafter, you can add more directors or a company secretary if you wish.
Terminate the existing director and company secretary
Subsequently, the company formation agent would terminate the existing director by submitting the form TM01 with Companies House. If there is a company secretary appointed, the appointment will be terminated too using the form TM02.
Shareholders information
Concurrently, you would also be required to give details of the person who will be holding your ready made company shares. Your director can also be the shareholder in this instance. The company formation agent would transfer the ownership of the existing shares to your shareholder. This would be done by filing a confirmation statement.
Company’s principal activity
Normally, a ready-made company’s is registered with a dormant company SIC code. You may let your company formation agent know what would be your company’s principal business activity so that they can update the SIC code for you. Alternatively, If the company formation agent did not change the SIC code, you can change it yourself afterwards. It is very easy to add and remove SIC code when completing your confirmation statement later on.
Registered office address
Let the company formation agent know if you are not going to use their registered office address and you have your own address. They would update the registered office address with Companies House for you.
The person with Significant Control (PSC)
You would be required to provide details of the person with significant control (PSC) of your ready-made company. The agent would submit the form PSC01 to register your PSC details with Companies House. At the same time, they would submit the form PSC07 to remove their PSC from your ready-made company.
Your Company authentication code
Do not forget to ask for your company authentication code from your agent. This code is important when comes to using Companies House web filing service to submit your confirmation statement, company accounts, appoint directors and so on.
Your Unique Tax Reference (UTR) number
Also, ask your agent for the UTR number issued by HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) for your ready-made company. You need this UTR number when corresponding with HMRC every time.
