Verifying your identity with Companies House from Canada: a guide for British directors

If you are a British director or person with significant control (PSC) of a UK company living in Canada, you must verify your identity with Companies House, and you can do it from there. The free route is GOV.UK One Login: it reads the chip in a biometric passport with an NFC phone and takes a face match. One Login cannot always be used from abroad, because its fall-backs, security questions drawn from a UK credit file or an in-person check at a Post Office, need a UK footprint. The other route is an Authorised Corporate Service Provider (ACSP), an agent registered with Companies House and supervised for anti-money laundering, which checks your British passport and a proof of address and tells Companies House. Either way you get one 11-character personal code that covers every company you are involved in.

Who has to verify, and by when

The duty covers every director and individual PSC, once, for every role. An existing director's deadline is the company's confirmation statement due date, and the statement cannot be filed until every director has verified. An existing PSC who is also a director has 14 days from that date; one who is not has the first 14 days of their birth month, in the transition year to 18 November 2026. By 30 June 2026 only 55% of directors and 42% of PSCs had verified.

Why One Login cannot always be used from Canada

The app route needs a passport with a chip, an NFC phone to read it and a face match that passes. Your British passport's chip reads in Calgary as it would in Carlisle. An older passport, a phone without NFC or a failed face match can stop it, and the fall-backs need a UK footprint. Canadian credit does not feed a UK credit file, so the questions often cannot be generated, and the Post Office is an ocean away. There is no manual route at Companies House and nobody there can override the check.

The other route: an ACSP

Vaulex Group Ltd is an ACSP. From Canada: upload your British passport and a proof of address at https://my.vaulex.co.uk/verify, complete the biometric checks on your phone, and an AML-qualified reviewer checks everything; we tell Companies House; your personal code arrives by email from Companies House. £149.99 per person, standard, three working days from when everything is in. Fast track £349 per person: 24 hours counted on working days, from the point your biometric checks are complete and we have everything we need.

Use your passport while it is in date. Dual citizens send the British passport; if the name on it differs from the register, tell us when you upload.

Proof of address in Canada

Any of these in your own name, recent and showing your home address, will do: a bank or credit card statement from RBC, TD, Scotiabank, BMO or CIBC, a utility bill from Hydro One, BC Hydro, Hydro-Québec or Enbridge, your provincial driver's licence, a CRA Notice of Assessment, a property tax bill, a lease, or a mortgage statement. PDFs from online banking are fine; the reviewer needs to read your name, your address and a recent date.

Two snags. The language: a document in French from Quebec is reviewed like any other. The name: a bill in your spouse's name proves where they live, not where you live; a bank statement in your own name is the quickest fix. Write the address as the document shows it, unit number and all, so the reviewer can match it to the register.

Tax residence is a separate matter; the proof of address is simply where you live.

Timing it from Canada

Toronto, Ottawa and Montreal are five hours behind the UK, Winnipeg six, Calgary seven and Vancouver eight, except for a few weeks each spring and autumn when the clocks change on different dates. The UK working day runs from 4am to noon in Toronto and 1am to 9am in Vancouver, so upload before lunch Eastern, or the evening before Pacific, to land on the same UK working day. Working days are UK working days; Canada Day does not change the count. Due next week? Choose the fast track.

The letter that went to a house in the UK

Many people in Canada keep the registered office at a relative's house in the UK, where the date can pass unopened. Since 4 March 2024 a registered office must be an "appropriate address", and a relative's house meets that only while someone there opens the mail and tells you the same day. Switch Business Pro moves it to Vaulex House in Penarth for £39.99 a month, every letter scanned the day it arrives: https://vaulex.co.uk/switch/.

If the date has passed

Companies House's letters say you may be committing an offence and may face prosecution, a fine or a financial penalty. On 16 September 2026 three directors were convicted after Insolvency Service prosecutions; "There is no option to opt out", the Insolvency Service said. Not filing a confirmation statement is itself an offence and can lead to strike-off. This is information, not legal advice; we are not solicitors or accountants.

Start when you are ready

Your personal code goes in the confirmation statement for a director, or through the PSC verification service for a PSC. If you already have one, you do not verify again.

If One Login works for you, use it. If not, start at https://my.vaulex.co.uk/verify with your British passport, a Canadian statement or bill and your phone. Check who in your company still needs to verify, free: https://guides.vaulex.co.uk/am-i-affected.