Unique identifiers (UID) – Companies House Identity Verification
What is IDV? Under the changes brought in by ECCTA 2023, Companies House is introducing a new identity verification process to help prevent economic crime. Anyone setting up, running, owning or controlling a legal entity in the UK will need to verify their identity to prove they are who they claim to be. They will need to be identity verified – “IDV”.
This means that for new entities, all directors, LLP members and people with significant control (PSCs) will need to complete identity verification.
For existing entities, all directors, LLP members and PSCs will have a transition period to verify their identity with Companies House.
From 8 April 2025, individuals have been able to verify their identity and obtain a personal code from Companies House. This code is not needed yet, but will start to be (based on current timings) sometime in Q3 2025.
Individuals will be able to verify:
- directly with Companies House through GOV.UK One Login, or
- through an Authorised Corporate Service Provider (ACSP).
However it is done, Companies House will email the personal code to the individual and each individual code will need a unique email address. So if you are an ACSP planning to complete IDV for all your clients and client’s stakeholders, you wont be able to get their personal codes sent to a single email address – which could be irritating, to put it mildly!
What is a UID? This is the Unique ID code that Companies House will generate for each individual that completes IDV. It has also been referred to as the Personal Code. The UID can be obtained by individuals (i) completing IDV directly via OneLogin; or (ii) using an ACSP to complete IDV for them.
For data protection reasons, which ever method is used, Companies House will email the UID directly to the individual. So if you use an ACSP to obtain your UID, the UID will still be emailed to you for future filings.
Can I use Kudocs to complete IDV? No. This is not a service that Kudocs is able to provide. However, the process is relatively easy to do via one of two different routes:
- directly with Companies House through GOV.UK One Login, or
- through an Authorised Corporate Service Provider (ACSP).
Can I store a UID in Kudocs? Yes! Kudocs has begun implementing changes to support the new ECCTA requirements. You can now store UID’s as part of a stakeholder profile. While the UID is not required by Companies House yet, it will be later this year, so this allows you to store information in advance of the changes.
As an individual will have only 1 UID, where an individual has multiple roles across multiple entities (e.g. they are a director of 20 companies and LLP member of 5 companies) Kudocs can help you bulk apply the UID to all of those roles. Please contact us for more information.
Will Kudocs use UID’s for future submissions to Companies House? Yes. Once Companies House confirms the changes they are requiring, Kudocs will make the necessary adjustments. This will mean that UIDs will be submitted automatically to Companies House when using Kudocs, or if a UID is missing, Kudocs will flag this to you, so you can resolve the issue.