There are four company documents that are issued to you upon setting up your company, for you to keep permanently on file.

When we incorporate your company, you will receive four permanent documents from us for you to keep on file for your company.

• Certificate of Incorporation
• Memorandum and Articles of Association
• Statutory books
• Share certificates

Certificate of incorporation

The certificate of incorporation is the company’s birth certificate and contains the company number, which you may need when signing contracts with a client or provider. It is also required when setting up the company bank account. Companies House issue your Certificate of Incorporation to us in the form of an electronic image and we supply copies of this to you, together with prints of the Memorandum and Articles of Association, the statutory books and the share certificates. Further copies can be produced at any time.

Memorandum and articles of association

When you register your company we will produce for you:

• A ‘memorandum of association’ – a legal statement signed by all initial shareholders agreeing to form the company.
• ‘Articles of association’ – written rules about running the company agreed by the shareholders, directors and the company secretary.

Statutory books

We keep your statutory books on our system, and we hold your share certificates for safekeeping.

The statutory books consist of five individual registers which, with the minutes of the company, constitute the official legal records of the company:

1. Register of Members – This shows the names and addresses of all the shareholders of the company, together with the dates when they bought and sold their shares.
2. Register of Directors – This shows the names and addresses, country of residence, nationality, occupation and date of birth of all the directors of the company, together with the dates when they were appointed and resigned.
3. Register of Secretaries – This shows the names and addresses of all those who have been secretary of the company, together with the dates when they were appointed and resigned.
4. Register of Directors’ Interests – This shows the number of shares held by each director.
5. Register of Mortgages and Charges – This shows all charges specifically affecting the property of the company, and all floating charges on the property of the company. A copy of every registered charge must be kept at the registered office, and particulars of any charges, and the original documents creating them, must be filed at Companies House within 21 days of their creation. Please note that it is very unusual for our clients to have any entries in this register.

Share certificates

Share certificate are legal documents that are issued to the shareholders of a company to confirm ownership of a certain number of shares from a specific date. We issue these upon forming the company to you. In the event that you wish the change the company shareholding, we issue new share certificates to you.