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Section 1197: Name containing inappropriate indication of company type or legal form

Companies Act 2006 · 2006 c. 46View on legislation.gov.uk

Part 41: Business names — Chapter 1: Restricted or prohibited names

The Secretary of State may make provision by regulations prohibiting a person from carrying on business in the United Kingdom under a name consisting of or containing specified words, expressions or other indications—

that are associated with a particular type of company or form of organisation, or
that are similar to words, expressions or other indications associated with a particular type of company or form of organisation.

The regulations may prohibit the use of words, expressions or other indications—

in a specified part, or otherwise than in a specified part, of a name;
in conjunction with, or otherwise than in conjunction with, such other words, expressions or indications as may be specified.

In this section "specified" means specified in the regulations.

Regulations under this section are subject to negative resolution procedure.

A person who uses a name in contravention of regulations under this section commits an offence.

Where an offence under this section is committed by a body corporate, an offence is also committed by every officer of the body who is in default.

A person guilty of an offence under this section is liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding level 3 on the standard scale and, for continued contravention, a daily default fine not exceeding one-tenth of level 3 on the standard scale.

About this text

This legislation text comes from legislation.gov.uk. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. These source and reuse terms cover the legislation text, not Remedy's commentary.

Reuse reviewed 21 August 2026 under Open Government Licence v3.0.