Companieshouse Omdömen 

I’m writing this in the hope that Companies House will see the feedback.

Staff at Companies House are generally polite, however, new changes have caused chaos, not been explained clearly (I often get contradictory info from different staff) and not well planned.

Just received an email from Companies House full of contradictions, hypotheticals and confusing jargon. Even after resorting to AI to try to make sense of it the conclusion was that the email was muddled and contradictory. In addition, in a world where technology has come along in strides I was told I ‘may’ need to send photocopies of documents in the post!

If changes are to be introduced then for goodness’ sake PLEASE be clear on what needs to happen, make sure your staff understands, and be properly prepared in terms of resources and systems for the change!

This has not been the case making changes so much more stressful than they need to be for all concerned!

Wasted 2 hours trying to incorporate a company and then got a system fault. Got round the fault as it was complaining about a valid address, but found that you cannot update this later.

Would give a score of -1 if possible.

I was let down by my experience overall. I found the website and user experience to be dreadful, poorly implemented, and overly complicated, leading to significant frustration. I encountered an issue with the service, it was dysfunctional and not fit for purpose. The customer service was a unhelpful, rude, and incompetent, with no offer of assistance other than start the process again from the beginning
No wonder there are more GOV.UK logins than there are people in the UK.

I genuinely struggle to see the value in Companies House beyond being a compulsory filing system that charges you for using it. The recent identity verification process was particularly poor - confusing, repetitive, and clearly not ready for release. I spent over a week stuck in a loop, repeatedly trying to complete verification while dealing with a system that felt buggy and untested. Support was no help at all, consisting mainly of generic, copy-and-paste responses that didn’t address the actual issues.
Having finally got through that ordeal, I then needed to file my confirmation statement - something I’ve done without issue for years using the previous WebFiling system. Unfortunately, the new system is a significant step backwards. What used to be straightforward became time-consuming and stressful, ultimately costing £50 and a considerable amount of time over the Easter weekend and the following 10 days or so.
The most frustrating part is the lack of meaningful support. Queries were misunderstood, responses were irrelevant, and instead of resolving issues, I was repeatedly warned about penalties for late filing—despite the problems clearly being caused by the system itself.
It’s hard to understand why a working system was replaced with one that is more complicated and less reliable. Basic expectations such as proper testing before rollout and adequately trained support staff don’t seem unreasonable.
At the moment, the experience feels unnecessarily difficult and poorly managed.

Twice I have sent a DS01 form with a fee and no actions has been taken. abysmal , civil servants need to get back into the office and do some work like the rest of us

The Companies House verification process through GOV.UK is dysfunctional. If the name recorded for director at Companies Hoise is not exactly as in the passport, driving licence or BRP then it is rejected and the person locked out. This may be due to an apostrophe of a S/O that is in the documens but not included at Companies House. One is then locked out and cannot use the Post Office in-person option. The GOV.UK helpline is of no help. They say they can only help if one uses Google Chrome or Firefpox as browsers and not Microsoft Edge. I do not wish to use the former two as they have conditions and disruptions that I do not like. Companies House is not able to offer a soluyion other than suggesting using ACPS, which costs. They do not provide a link on the verification page to list and do not inform anything about cost. There is nothing to ensure that after paying the same name maytch problem will not occur

The verification process is impossible for some, yet companies house don't care. They tell you that your only option is to use an ACSP which back in November might have cost each director £25. Now - due to the fact that the verification process is failing - this can cost upwards of £100 per director. If they had "Verified" their own processes prior to implementation, companies house would not now be passing on erroneous costs to cash strapped dormant companies directors. It's an absolute disgrace that they take no responsibility for their poor judgement in enforcing this process on us. Shame on you, Companies House.

Having just tried to verify and and do a confirmation statement, I can concur with literally every other reviewer on here.

Ridiculous, confusing and non performant.

Companies house, it literally sucks balls as a process.

I recently went through the online incorporation process and encountered a persistent "Service Unavailable" error when entering my co-founder's residential address. I tried five times over several hours with no success. The Companies House status page showed everything as normal, with no warning anywhere in the application journey that this feature was broken.

With no other option to progress, I used an office address as a placeholder — fully intending to correct it on approval. The next day my application was rejected for using a non-residential address.

When I called Companies House, the agent confirmed they were already aware of the bug. Yet there was no warning shown to users, and no reasonable fix was offered. The two options I was given were: pay 25% more to apply by post (over a four-day Easter bank holiday weekend), or incorporate without my co-founder and add them later – a messy workaround for something that was entirely their system's fault.

About 30 minutes after the call, I tried again and it worked – the bug had been silently fixed. The agent had no knowledge of this.

The core issue isn't just the bug – it's that a critical, known failure had no user-facing notice, and the resolution offered was entirely unreasonable. For a government service that founders depend on for something as important as company formation, this is simply not good enough.

I have filed a formal complaint and hope this review helps other founders know what to watch out for.

This is the worst front end interface on any iy system ever. Confusing, bloated, misleading and overcomplicated. It took 2 days to verify and submit a confirmation statement which used to take 10 minutes as a shuttle return. The government clearly is driving less competant IT users to suicide or massive penalties for late submission. We are still waiting for acceptance of the return, despite no changes having been made from last year.

The whole id verification process demonstrates the grossest incompetence on the part of those responsible. What could have been a straightforward process was made ridiculously complex and confusing, especially the requirement for doing everything multiple times, even though CH knows it is the same person. Why on earth a limited 14 day window, why change the login process at the same time, why a dozen other stupid things?

Then of course it turns out that the supposedly secure storage of data is wide open to the internet for months.

The most absurd system trying to verify directors and submit documentation. The CH security system won’t allow me to change the way I receive security codes. When I enquire how to resolve the issue I’m told it’s my responsibility to submit the documentation. Utterly moronic.

Prices through the roof now. £50 for a confirmation statement. Joke when they don’t even do anything you fill the form out yourself online

Would give it ZERO. Unbelievably complex, illogical, impossible to follow and time consuming. I have lost the plot on the reason for doing it or for the value it is supposed to have. Having added my personal and private information in various places so many times to no avail it’s quite likely that the entire cloud is busy recycling my details for free. The apparent interplay between phones and tablets is unfathomable… I had to use my Partners phone to eventually get my code ( I think it was successful!). There is absolutely no chance that can possibly achieve full compliance using this system.

what a dreadful, poorly implemented website. tried to change details for secretary, director, person of control, went round in circles. date entered and updated did not get saved. A dark age experience. As someone who has spent decades working in IT and in the government sector I'm horrified to see such a poor user experience.

Would give zero if I could, went through the face recognition, that didn't work, went to the post office, the staff there were quite happy I was who I said I was, took my photo etc etc. Then I received an email with a link to the site and was informed they could not verify my identity but could not give me any info as to why that was. I also found it very difficult navigating all the different sites. I have spent hours trying to complete the process. I would go so far as to say this is the worst most difficult site I have ever encountered.

Zero stars. Companyhouse‘s “public register“ means they put your data on google search for 20 years / permanently. Your dob, adress, nationality, too many details about business they put all over the internet publically for anyone and everyone to see, which can be massively detrimental for you. It‘s absolute bs and simply abusive that a British agency even allows this and doesn‘t protect their citizens at all. Furthermore they will send you fees/fines that are not clear stated. Absolute nightmare. Their customerservice is a tragedy. Zero zero zero stars for them. Don‘t use!!!!!!!!

Just spent 1hr trying to verify my ID on companies house website. It’s impossible! The system is not fit for purpose. Who designed this rubbish system, I need to bill them for wasting my time.

The identity verification process for Companies House is dysfunctional, inoperable and is a total embarrassment. It sends you in loops that you can't escape from, occasionally showing a "Sorry we are experiencing technical difficulties". We've wasted hours trying to work out how to do it. We've managed to scan our IDs and faces, but we still don't have the illusive personal codes. So our Confirmation Statements will be late. But at this stage I am furious with the whole debacle and have given up.

ID verification is clunky and arcane. It is not fit for purpose and is wasting a lot time. We have been trying for over a month now without success.

This entire Companies House needs to be closed down immediately and a couple of AI developers create a site and a workflow that does far better than over 2000 of the most inefficient pen pushers can currently deliver.

The website, paperwork, lack of any sort of customer service and the most archaic inefficient systems and processes in the world is just laughable.

If I could give this a -100 I would, but unfortunately the score only goes down to 1.

If you ever want a master class in how not to run an organisation, this is it. Absolute waste of space.