Companies House
identity verification
Every director and person with significant control has to prove who they are to Companies House. ClearCash is a registered Authorised Corporate Service Provider, so we can verify you and confirm it to Companies House on your behalf — from your phone, in about five minutes.
First, should you even pay for this?
Plenty of people shouldn't. Here's the honest split.
Do it free yourself
Companies House verifies you directly at no cost through GOV.UK One Login. If this describes you, use it — paying anyone would be paying for nothing.
- You hold a current UK passport or UK photo driving licence
- Your name and address match what the register already holds
- You have a smartphone with a decent camera
- You haven't tried and been rejected
Have us do it
An ACSP check is a different process with a person behind it, and it accepts a wider set of documents. Worth paying for when the free route won't work or already hasn't.
- One Login has already rejected you once or twice
- Your documents aren't UK, or you live abroad
- You've moved, married, or the register is out of date
- You want it documented, with a certificate
What the check actually does
Three things happen, and you get the evidence for all of them.
Your document, checked properly
Passport, driving licence or national ID, read and validated rather than eyeballed — including non-UK documents the free route isn't built for.
A face that matches it
A short selfie with a liveness check, so it's provably a live person and provably the same one as the document.
Sanctions and PEP screening
Screening against sanctions and politically-exposed-person lists runs as part of the same check, with the result stored alongside it.
How it works
You do the first three. We do the rest.
- Tell us who you are Name, date of birth, nationality and the role you hold — the details that go on the check.
- Pay securely Card payment handled by Stripe. We never see your card details.
- Scan and smile Photograph your ID and take a short selfie. Two minutes, on your phone.
- We confirm it to Companies House As an ACSP we tell them we've verified you, usually the same working day.
- Companies House emails your code They send you an 11-character personal code. It comes from them, not from us.
Your personal code is yours to keep
Companies House issues the code directly to you and it's the thing you'll actually use — you'll need it each time you appear as a director or person with significant control, including on your company's confirmation statement. Save the email. You don't need to send the code back to us.
Start your check
Have your photo ID to hand — the check begins straight after payment.
You can also do this free. Companies House lets you verify yourself at no cost using GOV.UK One Login. People come to us when that route fails them — a rejected photo, an address that doesn't match, facial recognition that won't play — or when they'd rather it was handled and documented properly first time. We're not Companies House and we're not the only way to do this.
Questions people ask first
It reaches the same place. Companies House requires an ACSP check to meet the same standard as verifying directly, and ACSPs have to be registered with them and supervised for anti-money-laundering. What differs is the range of documents accepted and the fact that someone deals with it when something doesn't fit.
Identity verification became compulsory on 18 November 2025, with a transition year for people already in post. In practice you need your personal code by your company's next confirmation statement, and 18 November 2026 is the backstop.
No. You verify once as a person, and the personal code you receive covers every role you hold across every company.
We'll tell you why and what would fix it — usually a clearer photo or a different document. Get in touch rather than paying twice.
Yes, and if you're verifying several people at once it's worth talking to us first — we do this for accountancy practices and their client companies as well as for individuals.
We've written an honest comparison of the free route and the paid one, including the specific ways GOV.UK One Login tends to fail. Read the guide.