How to read Companies House filings — a plain-English guide

Start with the filing timeline, not the numbers

The single most useful pass on a Companies House filing history is the timeline. Scan the dates. A healthy trading company has a predictable rhythm — accounts once a year, CS01 once a year, small housekeeping filings sprinkled between. Anomalies show themselves at a glance: a five-year silence, a flurry of director changes right before an accounts deadline, a sudden AA01 to move year-end back nine months, an MR01 stack just before a charity dinner.

Reading the accounts (AA)

Most UK private companies qualify as "small" and file abridged, unaudited accounts under FRS 102 Section 1A (bigger) or FRS 105 (micro-entities, tiny). Full accounts are only required at medium+ size. What you get depends on the size — and this is where most people misread "a P&L is missing" as suspicious when it's simply legally optional.

The balance sheet lines that matter

• Fixed assets — plant, property, intangibles. Trading businesses usually have some.
• Debtors — money owed to the company. Rising debtors + flat turnover = collection problem.
• Cash at bank — the health check. Zero cash + rising creditors = distress.
• Creditors falling due within one year — short-term obligations. Compare to cash + debtors.
• Shareholders' funds — net worth. Negative shareholders' funds means the company owes more than it owns.

For a step-by-step comparison of small-company vs full accounts see statutory vs abbreviated accounts, and for the smallest filers see micro-entity accounts.

Reading the confirmation statement (CS01)

The CS01 is a five-page confirmation of who's on the register. Nothing on it is financial. What matters:

• SIC codes — up to four industry codes. A construction company suddenly filing under 82990 "other business support services" is worth asking about.
• Statement of capital — how many shares, of what class, at what nominal value. Changes here often signal an investor round or a share buy-back.
• Shareholders — full list included when there are ≤50 shareholders.
• Trading on a market — almost always "no" for private companies.

Full walkthrough on the CS01 and its deadlines in the confirmation statement checker guide.

People filings — AP01, TM01, CH01

Officer changes are the single richest signal of governance events. Read them in groups, not individually:

• Two directors resign the same day — investigate. Boardroom fallout or investor exit.
• New director appointed and old one resigns 24 hours later — nominee handover, often pre-sale.
• Auditor resignation followed by year-end change — a classic pattern for pushing back publication of poor results.

Use the officer network explorer to see everywhere else these individuals sit — that's where the story tends to be.

PSC filings — PSC01 through PSC09

PSC (Person with Significant Control) is the beneficial-owner register. There are nine form codes covering appointments, terminations, changes in share bands, and registration of a "relevant legal entity" (typically a holding company). Two red flags are common enough to memorise:

• "No PSC identified" on a trading company that's been alive for more than 12 months.
• The PSC rotates between individuals every few months — a laundering typology.

Deep dive in how to check company ownership and quick lookups at the PSC tool.

Charges — MR01 and MR04

The charges register lists every piece of secured lending. It answers one question: if this company were dissolved tomorrow, who gets paid first?

One or two MR01s against mainstream lenders (banks, asset-finance houses) is normal. What's not normal: three or more MR01s in the last twelve months, especially from short-term or invoice-finance providers. It usually means cash flow is being kept alive by ever-shorter facilities. Watch for MR04 filings against each MR01 to confirm which debts have been repaid.

Insolvency and strike-off filings

If any of these appear, treat the company as in distress and read the insolvency practitioner's proposals or Gazette notice before doing anything else:

• DS01 — voluntary strike-off application. Directors are asking to be dissolved.
• Gazette 1st notice / 2nd notice — the register is dissolving the company.
• Statement of affairs — the formal insolvency starting point.
• Progress reports — administrator or liquidator updates every 6 or 12 months.

See our strike-off notice guide for what each stage means to suppliers, and our administration explainer for formal insolvency.

The overlooked filings

Two filings routinely surface useful signals and are almost always ignored:

• Directors' report / strategic report — narrative on the year. Often more revealing than the numbers. See reading directors' and strategic reports.
• AA01 (accounting reference date change) — a shift of nine months is usually a signal to delay uncomfortable numbers.

How Sell Ltd surfaces this automatically

Every company page on Sell Ltd flags late accounts, missing CS01, unsatisfied charges in the last 12 months, PSC gaps, and Gazette insolvency mentions — the same signals you'd extract manually. Start at the free company checker or run a specific score on the credit score tool.

Related reading

• How to check if a UK company is legit
• Statutory vs abbreviated accounts
• Micro-entity accounts explained
• Small company exemption filings
• Companies House terminology A–Z
• Company checker FAQ