There was an interesting piece in the Sunday newspapers about the
sloppiness of Companies House allowing fraudsters essentially a free
pass to conduct VAT frauds on imports and various other more
sophisticated money for nothing enterprises. From the Guardian/Observer:

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2025/feb/08/rare-metal-assets-4000-workers-a-canary-wharf-hq-but-does-this-billion-pound-firm-really-exist

BTW with regard to the above I thought there was already an automatic
strike off for failing to file company accounts in a timely fashion.

Why are there no sanity checks for the most common signs of malpractice?

I'm thinking here of large blocks of mass produced similarly named
companies (eg DodgyGeezer_suffix 01 through 50) with the same two
directors and all registered to the same convenience address/PO BOX.

Likewise for huge numbers of Chinese importers VAT registered to the
same street or in one instance an unlucky individual's home address:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-65205520

In this case it was HMRC being sloppy, and they only took it seriously
when a BBC Wales consumer programme got involved in the sad story.

Also it seems unreasonable to me that the number of employees of a
privately owned company is not a part of the publicly visible record.
Far too easy to pretend to have (lots of) employees when there are none.

--
Martin Brown

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 10/02/2025 19:36, Martin Brown wrote:

Likewise for huge numbers of Chinese importers VAT registered to the
same street or in one instance an unlucky individual's home address:

Companies House will now remove company registered offices from
addresses they have no right to be. When I asked them to do this, it was
done in a couple of weeks.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 2025-02-12, GB <NOTsomeone@microsoft.invalid> wrote:

On 10/02/2025 19:36, Martin Brown wrote:

Likewise for huge numbers of Chinese importers VAT registered to the
same street or in one instance an unlucky individual's home address:

Companies House will now remove company registered offices from
addresses they have no right to be. When I asked them to do this, it was
done in a couple of weeks.

Did they do something like send a letter to the address containing a
code which you then quoted to them to prove you were at that address?

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 12/02/2025 09:58, Jon Ribbens wrote:

On 2025-02-12, GB <NOTsomeone@microsoft.invalid> wrote:

On 10/02/2025 19:36, Martin Brown wrote:

Likewise for huge numbers of Chinese importers VAT registered to the
same street or in one instance an unlucky individual's home address:

Companies House will now remove company registered offices from
addresses they have no right to be. When I asked them to do this, it was
done in a couple of weeks.

Did they do something like send a letter to the address containing a
code which you then quoted to them to prove you were at that address?

See

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/report-a-company-using-your-personal-details-without-your-permission

I sent them a copy of the LR title.


The reply I received was as follows:


You recently applied to change XXX LTD

registered office address

service address

The company has not changed its registered office address / service
addresses.

We have also not received sufficient evidence that the registered office address is appropriate, or that the company has permission to use the
address as a service address.

As a result, we’ve changed the addresses to a default address at
Companies House.

We have also administratively removed any reference to the addresses
from the document image displayed on our website.

We will write to the company to let them know we’ve changed the address.

The company has the right to appeal this decision through the court.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

Jon Ribbens wrote:

Did they do something like send a letter to the address containing a
code which you then quoted to them to prove you were at that address?

When I had a bogus director, using a name similar to mine and my address
for a bogus company, I contacted C/H, they said they would write to the
bogus director at my address, and that I should *NOT* reply to that letter.

When the letter arrived, it basically told the bogus director to reply,
or the company would be struck off.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 2025-02-12, GB <NOTsomeone@microsoft.invalid> wrote:

On 12/02/2025 09:58, Jon Ribbens wrote:

On 2025-02-12, GB <NOTsomeone@microsoft.invalid> wrote:

On 10/02/2025 19:36, Martin Brown wrote:

Likewise for huge numbers of Chinese importers VAT registered to the
same street or in one instance an unlucky individual's home address:

Companies House will now remove company registered offices from
addresses they have no right to be. When I asked them to do this, it was >>> done in a couple of weeks.

Did they do something like send a letter to the address containing a
code which you then quoted to them to prove you were at that address?

See

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/report-a-company-using-your-personal-details-without-your-permission

I sent them a copy of the LR title.

The reply I received was as follows:

You recently applied to change XXX LTD

registered office address

service address

The company has not changed its registered office address / service addresses.

We have also not received sufficient evidence that the registered office address is appropriate, or that the company has permission to use the
address as a service address.

Ah I see, they give the company a chance to object. That seems
reasonable.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On Wed, 12 Feb 2025 11:16:11 +0000, Jon Ribbens wrote:

On 2025-02-12, GB <NOTsomeone@microsoft.invalid> wrote:

On 12/02/2025 09:58, Jon Ribbens wrote:

On 2025-02-12, GB <NOTsomeone@microsoft.invalid> wrote:

On 10/02/2025 19:36, Martin Brown wrote:

Likewise for huge numbers of Chinese importers VAT registered to the >>>>> same street or in one instance an unlucky individual's home address:

Companies House will now remove company registered offices from
addresses they have no right to be. When I asked them to do this, it
was done in a couple of weeks.

Did they do something like send a letter to the address containing a
code which you then quoted to them to prove you were at that address?

See

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/report-a-company-using-your-personal- details-without-your-permission

I sent them a copy of the LR title.


The reply I received was as follows:


You recently applied to change XXX LTD

registered office address

service address

The company has not changed its registered office address / service
addresses.

We have also not received sufficient evidence that the registered
office address is appropriate, or that the company has permission to
use the address as a service address.

Ah I see, they give the company a chance to object. That seems
reasonable.

Similar to applying for a V5

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 12/02/2025 10:58, GB wrote:

As a result, we’ve changed the addresses to a default address at
Companies House.

That simply makes the company more anonymous!

If the Ltd company already have a bank account then they can continue to
trade!

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 2025-02-12, Fredxx <fredxx@spam.invalid> wrote:

On 12/02/2025 10:58, GB wrote:

As a result, we’ve changed the addresses to a default address at
Companies House.

That simply makes the company more anonymous!

No it doesn't. If the previous address was false then it makes it
exactly the same degree of anonymous, except now everyone looking
at the Companies House record should be able to easily see that it
is anonymous, rather than believing the false data.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 12/02/2025 12:05, Fredxx wrote:

On 12/02/2025 10:58, GB wrote:

As a result, we’ve changed the addresses to a default address at
Companies House.

That simply makes the company more anonymous!

If the Ltd company already have a bank account then they can continue to trade!

I've just checked the CoHo record of the company I complained about.

The address has been changed, including the words "Companies House
Default Address". The banks can check this (automatically if they are
sensible) and suspend accounts for any companies with that address.

In addition, CoHo has posted a Gazette notice with the intention of
striking off the company. That expired a couple of days ago.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)