Ready made companies

The term 'ready made company' is used in two different senses:

(1) to denote a company registered by a solicitor or company registration agent and kept in stock for sale and transfer to a client in due course;

(2) as a standard company formation, one set up on the instructions of a client, but using standard documentation rather than specially drafted memorandum and articles. This is what we offer as our standard company formation, though we do encourage people to make sure that the articles of association are suitable for the company being formed. (See further on our articles of association page.)

With regard to the first of these meanings, the practice has changed radically over the years. When we started in business over 30 years ago, three-quarters of all new companies were set up as ready made companies, in that sense. The main reason was that having a company registered from scratch took at least four weeks, and often considerably longer. The ready made company, already registered and available immediately, was a very convenient way of getting a new business set up within a reasonable time.

With electronic registration, which usually ensures that a new company is set up in a few hours, the ready made company had become almost obsolete and a cumbersome way of putting a new company in place. The name, the directors, shareholders, registered office, authorised share capital might all need to be changed.

Since 1st. October 2008 it has become impossible to register a company without an individual as a director. This has really brought the ready made company to an end. The practice has been for ready made companies to be set up only with corporate directors, so that no individual involved with its initial formation is exposed to any possible liability for what a future owner of the company might do in its name. For this reason, and the fact that the practice had become obsolete anyway, we have stopped stocking ready made companies.

Company Law website

Visit our company law website provided as a free service for Incorporation Services clients. It is the largest open source of UK company law information available on-line, including:

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