Register Of Company Secretaries (Individuals) (internal use only)

A private company is not required to have a company secretary (section 270 Companies Act 2006), however many companies continue to have a company secretary for administrative tasks and to take on some of the directors’ responsibilities.

The company secretary can be a director but cannot be:

• the company’s auditor
• an ‘undischarged bankrupt’ - unless they have permission from the court

Even if a company has a company secretary, the directors are legally responsible for the company.

If a private company has a company secretary, it may be an individual or a corporate secretary or firm. 

Under the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Act 2023 (ECCTA), the requirement for companies to maintain statutory registers (other than the register of members) is abolished. This takes effect as of 18th November 2025. This includes the register of secretaries. The register at Companies House will become the sole, verified source of this information. The ECCTA creates stringent requirements for keeping Companies House updated on all changes. These need to be notified to Companies House within 14 days of any appointment, resignation or change in a secretary's details occurring.

Companies may therefore completely dispense with its register of secretaries. However, many companies may wish to continue to maintain this register for internal purposes, at least for the time being. It may be considered good housekeeping and governance for a company to maintain their own internal records of the information that they were previously required to keep. In addition, the registers may be required for due diligence purposes, such as when a company is engaging with third parties (particularly investors and entities from abroad), if it is seeking a loan or if it is the target in an acquisition. Internal registers may be required to present historic and current information to these third parties in a clear and orderly manner.

For companies wishing to maintain their own internal registers, this template may be used. This template has been updated to reflect that this is now purely an internal record.

This register is in open format. The requisite details should be inserted in the highlighted fields or the wording adjusted to suit your purposes.

Once you have subscribed to the appropriate document folder click on the “Download Document” button below. You will be asked what you want to do with the file. It is recommended that you save the document to a location of your choice prior to viewing.

Register Of Company Secretaries (Individuals) (internal use only) is part of Employment. Just £38.50 + VAT provides unlimited downloads from Employment for 1 year.