The Economic Crime (Transparency and Enforcement) Act 2022 (the “Act”) established a register of overseas entities (the “ROE”), which came into force on 1st August 2022. The Act requires overseas entities which are the registered owners of UK property to register with the ROE.
Failure to register is a criminal offence. For those overseas entities which already own property in the UK, the Act makes provisions for sanctions where such entities have failed to register before 31st January 2023. These provisions have been bolstered by The Register of Overseas Entities (Penalties and Northern Ireland Dispositions) Regulations 2023 (the “Regulations”). The Regulations came into force on 21st June 2023 and give the Registrar of Companies new powers to impose fines on overseas entities which have not yet complied with their obligation to register with the ROE.
The practical effect of the Act and introduction of the ROE is that they will now need to register with the ROE prior to completion.
Here at De Pinna Notaries, our role as Scrivener Notaries means that we have a wealth of experience in dealing with overseas entities (including those established in offshore jurisdictions). As lawyer-linguists, we can review due diligence in various languages other than English without the need for translations. These skills allow us to provide a comprehensive Register of Overseas Entities service that helps overseas entities with not only the verification but also the registration elements of the ROE registration process.
The Act sets out the requirement for an overseas entity to make an application to Companies House. In order to be registered, the information contained within the application presented to Companies House must, within the three months prior to registration, be verified by a UK-registered agent who falls within the category of persons set out in regulation 8 of The Money Laundering, Terrorist Financing and Transfer of Funds (Information on the Payer) Regulations 2017, including, amongst others, notaries.
Each verification process is unique depending on the nature of the overseas entity as well as its ownership and, sometimes, management structures.
We can walk you through the process of registering an overseas entity and, subject to conducting the necessary due diligence, verify and register it quickly and efficiently.
De Pinna Notaries is the largest firm of Scrivener Notaries in London and a dedicated team of our notaries are registered as verification agents at Companies House. We are experienced in verifying and registering overseas entities, from the simplest to the most complex of corporate structures.
De Pinna Notaries offer a personal service and ROE instructions are directly handled by the verification agent who engages with the representative(s) of the overseas entity through a video call to ascertain what information you need to provide to us and the most efficient way of doing so.
