AML & Identity Checks

1. Why we check

Forming companies and providing a registered office, a service address or a business address are regulated activities. Firms doing them must be supervised for anti-money laundering purposes and must carry out customer due diligence. Separately, since 18 November 2025 Companies House has required every director and person with significant control to have their identity verified. As an ACSP we can carry out that verification and tell Companies House.

2. Who we can act for

• People who live in the UK, and businesses based in the UK – for every service.
• Expats, for identity verification. If you live outside the UK, hold a current British passport and are, or will be, a director or person with significant control of a UK company, we can verify your identity for Companies House. Once you are verified, that company may move its registered office to us on a switch package.
• Nobody else outside the UK. An order from anyone else living outside the UK, or from a business based outside the UK, is declined and refunded in full to the card that paid, unless the law requires us to hold the funds.
• Where an expat lives. We cannot act for anyone living in a country on the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) "call for action" list. For a country under FATF "increased monitoring", and for a small number of others on our own risk assessment, we need extra checks, including evidence of the source of funds, and our compliance approval before we act – and we may decline.
• Services we never provide: nominee directors, nominee shareholders and trust services.

3. How we verify your identity

As standard, with nCino identity verification technology. We send you a secure link. You scan your identity document with your phone – where the document has a chip, the chip is read – and take a live selfie. nCino checks that the document is genuine and that your face matches its photograph.

Where that cannot be completed – for example, your phone cannot read the chip – we check your documents ourselves and confirm your likeness on a live video call. We never rely on photographs alone. For this manual check we need two photographic identity documents, or one photographic document and one supporting document such as a recent bank statement or utility bill, as the Companies House identity verification standard sets out. We do not record video calls; we note the date, time and outcome on your file.

Expats verify with a British passport.

Either way, a trained person at Vaulex Group reviews the result and makes the decision. Where we verify you for Companies House, we then tell Companies House, and Companies House emails you your personal code.

4. What else we check

• Screening – sanctions lists, politically exposed persons (PEPs) and adverse media, when you join and periodically afterwards.
• Address – where you live, evidenced where required, for example by a recent bank statement or utility bill. For expats, this shows where you live abroad.
• Electronic identity and address checks – which may use credit reference agency data. This leaves a record on your credit file that only you can see. It does not affect your credit score.
• Company structure – directors, shareholders and beneficial owners, including anyone who owns or controls more than 25 per cent. For an existing company we keep a copy of what the Companies House register shows about its people with significant control.
• Purpose – what the business does, why you need our service and, for a new company, how it will be funded and where it will trade. We ask these questions when you order.
• Payment – your card must be in your name or the business's name. We do not accept cash, bank transfers or payments from third parties.
• Source of funds – where the risk requires it.

5. Nothing starts until the checks are complete

We hold every first order until our checks are complete. No company is filed, no registered office changed and no address goes live before then. If we decline a formation, Virtual Office or switch order at this stage, we refund what you paid in full to the card you paid with, unless the law requires us to hold the funds. For identity verification, see our Cancellation & Refunds policy.

6. Ongoing monitoring

Checks are not a one-off. We monitor the relationship for as long as it lasts. We check our clients' companies against the Companies House register every night, re-screen periodically and when sanctions lists change, review client profiles at least once a year, and may ask for updated information – particularly if your officers, ownership, activities, address or forwarding address change. Tell us within 14 days if they do.

7. If something does not clear

We may decline to act, or suspend or end an existing relationship. Where the law requires us to make a report, we must do so, and we may be legally prohibited from telling you that a report has been made or why we have declined. This is not evasiveness on our part; it is a criminal offence for us to tip off.

If what we find is materially different from the Companies House register of people with significant control, the law requires us to report the difference to Companies House.

8. Businesses we do not act for

We will not provide services where we cannot satisfy ourselves about identity, ownership or purpose, or in activities that fall outside our risk appetite. See our Acceptable Use policy.

9. Records and your data

We keep records of the checks we carry out until five years after our relationship with you ends, as the Money Laundering Regulations require, and records of identity checks for Companies House for seven years from the date of the check, including checks that do not succeed, as Companies House requires – whichever is later. This overrides any request to erase that data.

Personal data we obtain for these checks is used only to prevent money laundering, terrorist financing and proliferation financing, unless the law allows another use or you agree to it.

10. Your Companies House personal code

Verification produces a personal code which is yours, is not published on the register, and which you can use for every company you are involved with. You may share it with an agent who files for you. Keep it secure. If it is compromised, it can be replaced.

11. Our supervision

Questions about our checks, or a complaint about them: compliance@vaulex.co.uk.