UK company strike off, what triggers it, what it costs, and how to reverse it

Strike off is the process by which a company is removed from the Companies House register. Once struck off, the company ceases to exist as a legal entity. It can no longer own property, hold bank accounts, enter contracts, or trade. Any assets held by the company at the point of dissolution, including cash in a UK business bank account, become bona vacantia: property of the Crown. This is not a theoretical risk. It happens to Arab-owned UK companies regularly, often without the director realising the company has been dissolved.

There are two types of strike off. Voluntary strike off is when the director applies to dissolve the company, typically because the company has served its purpose, is no longer needed, or is too costly to maintain. There are conditions: the company must not have traded in the last three months, must not be subject to any legal proceedings, and must have settled all liabilities. Voluntary dissolution costs £13 online and takes two to three months. Compulsory strike off is initiated by Companies House, not the director. It happens when a company fails to file its confirmation statement or annual accounts, or when it's unreachable at its registered address. Companies House sends warning notices, to the registered office, then publishes a strike-off notice in the Gazette. If no objection is made within two months, the company is dissolved.

For Arab directors, compulsory strike off has a specific risk pattern. The registered office is in the UK; the director is abroad. Warning notices are sent to the registered office. If the registered office is unmanaged, an old address, a former accountant's address, a residential address the director no longer controls, the notices arrive, go unread, and the company is dissolved while the director has no idea. We have helped directors discover their companies were struck off months or years earlier when they tried to file accounts or access a UK bank account.

Reversing a strike off is possible but not simple. For compulsory dissolution, an application can be made to restore the company to the register, either administratively (within six years, by a former director) or by court order (within 20 years). Administrative restoration requires filing all overdue documents, paying all outstanding penalties, and paying a £341 application fee. Court restoration is more expensive and involves a solicitor. Any assets that passed to the Crown during the dissolution period require a separate bona vacantia claim to recover, which may or may not succeed depending on what the Crown has done with them.

The prevention arithmetic is straightforward. An Essentials plan with Fileminder costs £498 per year. An administrative restoration costs £341 in government fees alone, before accountancy fees to file the overdue documents, penalty costs for every late filing, and the time and stress of the process. One struck-off company costs more to restore than two years of prevention.