From 1 January 2007, Companies in the UK must include certain regulatory information on their websites and in their email footers or they will breach the Companies Act and risk a fine.

Every company should list its company registration number, place of registration and registered office address on its website as a result of an update to the legislation of 1985. The information, which must be in legible characters, should also appear on order forms and in emails. Such information is already required on 'business letters' but the duty is being extended to websites, order forms and electronic documents.

The change is being made by a Statutory Instrument that is expected to be passed on Thursday to implement a European law, the First Company Law Amendment Directive, into UK law. According to a Department of Trade and Industry spokesperson, the law will take effect on 1st January, one day later than the Directive requires. (The Companies (Registrar, Languages and Trading Disclosures) Regulations 2006 has now been passed.)

Information that must be on your website: an aide memoire:

The following is the minimum information that must be on any company's website:-

The name, geographic address and email address of the service provider. The name of the organisation with which the customer is contracting must be given.  This might differ from the trading name. Any such difference should be explained – e.g. "XYZ.com is the trading name of XYZ Enterprises Limited." 

It is not sufficient to include a 'contact us' form without also providing an email address and geographic address somewhere easily accessible on the site. A PO Box is unlikely to suffice as a geographic address; but a registered office address would. If the business is a company, the registered office address must be included.