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

A British director living in Portugal must verify their identity with Companies House in the same way, and by the same date, as a director living in the UK. The deadline belongs to the company: an existing director must verify before the company files its next confirmation statement due on or after 18 November 2025, and the statement cannot be filed until every director has. The free route is GOV.UK One Login, which cannot always be used from abroad. The other is an Authorised Corporate Service Provider (ACSP), which Companies House says you can use from any country. Either way you need a valid British passport and a proof of address for your Portuguese home, and once verified you receive an 11-character personal code that covers every company you are involved with.

Living in Portugal does not move the deadline

Under the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Act 2023, every director, every LLP member and every individual person with significant control (PSC) must verify once, wherever they live.

• An existing director: by the company's next confirmation statement due on or after 18 November 2025.
• An existing PSC who is also a director: within 14 days of the confirmation statement date.
• An existing PSC who is not a director: within the first 14 days of their birth month, during the transition year from 18 November 2025 to 18 November 2026.
• A new director: before the appointment. A new PSC: within 14 days of being registered.

Vaulex Group's analysis of the Companies House PSC snapshot of 17 October 2026 found 10,925 British nationals living abroad with a PSC verification date still outstanding, 5,993 of them already past it. Portugal accounts for 402 of those positions.

Route one: GOV.UK One Login from Portugal

The free 'Verify your identity for Companies House' service uses GOV.UK One Login and guides you to one of three methods: the app, security questions online, or entering your photo ID details and visiting a participating Post Office.

The app reads the chip in a biometric passport with an NFC-capable phone and takes a face match, and it can work from Portugal.

It cannot always be used from abroad, and this is why. The other two methods need a UK footprint: the security questions are drawn from a UK credit file, and the Post Office check means being at a Post Office in the UK. The app can stop at an older passport without a chip, a phone without NFC, a face match that fails, or a name that has changed. When it stops, the fall-backs need a UK address history that people who have lived in Portugal for years no longer have. Then you need route two.

Route two: an ACSP, from any country

Companies House guidance says you can ask an ACSP, also called a Companies House authorised agent, to verify your identity on your behalf, from any country. An ACSP is registered with Companies House and supervised for anti-money laundering by HMRC or a professional body. It checks your documents against the Companies House standard, keeps records for seven years and tells Companies House, which emails your personal code to the address the ACSP gave for you. Anyone can check an ACSP on the Companies House public register of ACSPs.

The ACSP will ask for your full name and any former names, date of birth, home address, address history for the last 12 months, email address and identity documents.

Your passport, including one close to expiry

A British passport is the government-issued photographic document the standard asks for from someone who does not live in the UK, and one that is in date is the simple case.

A passport close to expiry is not a problem. The standard says a person does not need to verify again if a document expires after the checks are complete, so your personal code does not expire with the passport. If it has already expired, ask before you upload: the standard allows a recently expired passport in some circumstances, depending on how it is checked.

Proof of address in Portuguese, or in your spouse's name

Companies House's list of supporting documents includes a bank statement, a mortgage statement, a utility bill and an insurance policy, each for your current address. Only the council tax and local-authority tenancy entries are specific to the UK, so a document for your Portuguese home is not ruled out. If unsure, ask before you upload.

• Use a document in your own name. A bill in your spouse's name alone does not show your address; a joint bank or mortgage statement showing both names does.
• If the name on it differs from your passport, a married name for instance, add the marriage certificate. The standard expects extra evidence where a name has changed, and that certificate is on the list.

If you moved in the last 12 months, be ready to show the previous address too.

The registered office at a relative's house

Since 4 March 2024 a registered office must be an 'appropriate address': one where a document delivered there would be expected to come to the attention of a person acting for the company, and where delivery can be acknowledged. Companies House can move a non-compliant company to a default address.

A parent's or sibling's house can meet that test, but only if they open or forward everything. Companies House writes to PSCs about their 14-day window, using the addresses on the register. If those letters sit unopened in a UK hallway while you are in Portugal, the window can close before you know it has opened. The free tool at https://guides.vaulex.co.uk/am-i-affected shows who at a company must verify, who has, and by when.

Working-day timing from Portugal

• Through Vaulex, the standard turnaround is three working days from the moment everything is in; fast-track is 24 hours on working days. Working days are UK working days.
• A PSC window is a fixed run of calendar dates, the 1st to the 14th of your birth month, and weekends inside it count. The Companies House letter says: 'You must comply with identity verification requirements by 14 October 2026.'
• A director's deadline is the company's confirmation statement due date.
• Your code arrives by email from Companies House, so check the spam folder.

If a PSC window is about to close, a 14-day extension can be requested through the PSC verification service, but only before the deadline has passed.

If One Login did not work for you

This is information, not legal advice; Vaulex is not a firm of solicitors or accountants. If One Login did not work, Vaulex Group Ltd is an ACSP (Companies House AP021384) and verifies British passport holders anywhere in the world for £149.99 per person. Upload your passport and proof of address from your phone at https://my.vaulex.co.uk/verify; a reviewer checks them, Vaulex tells Companies House, and your code arrives by email from Companies House. If the relative's hallway is the weak point, Switch moves the registered office to Vaulex House in Penarth, where every letter is scanned the day it arrives: https://my.vaulex.co.uk/switch.