Section 76B: Direction to change name wrongly registered

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

Part 5: A company's name — Chapter 4: Other powers of the Secretary of State and the registrar

The Secretary of State may direct a company to change its name if—

it appears to the Secretary of State that the company's registration by that name was in contravention of any requirement imposed by this Part, or
the Secretary of State did not, at the time at which the name was registered, form the opinion mentioned in section 53, 56A or 57A, but had proper grounds for doing so.

The direction must be in writing and must specify the period within which the company is to change its name.

The period must be a period of at least 28 days beginning with the date of the direction.

A company may apply to the court to set aside a direction under subsection (1).

Any application under subsection (5) must be made within the period of three weeks beginning with the date of the direction.

On an application under subsection (5) the court may set the direction aside or confirm it.

If on an application under subsection (5) the direction is confirmed, the court must specify the period within which the direction is to be complied with.

Where a direction is given under subsection (1), the registrar may omit from the material on the register that is available for public inspection any mention of the name to which the direction relates.

If a company applies to the court under subsection (5) to set aside a direction, the company is not required to comply with the direction while the proceedings are ongoing.

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.