I've Missed My Companies House Deadline — What Happens Now?

Companies House does not send a warning. There is no reminder letter, no grace period and no phone call. The day after your deadline passes, a penalty is generated automatically and a notice goes out. If you have just realised you are late, that penalty already exists.

The good news is that the amount is fixed by how late you are, not by how much you owe or how big your company is. So the single most useful thing you can do tonight is work out which band you are in — because the difference between bands is hundreds of pounds, and filing before you cross into the next one is worth real money.

The penalty, by how late you are

For a private limited company, measured from your filing deadline:

Public companies pay considerably more at every stage.

Read those bands again with an eye on the date, because this is where people lose money for no reason. If you are 29 days late, you owe £150. If you file on day 32, you owe £375. Nothing about your accounts changed. You simply crossed a line.

The part that catches people twice

If your accounts were filed late last year as well, the penalty is automatically doubled. Two consecutive late filings turn £150 into £300 and £1,500 into £3,000.

It is worth checking your filing history before you assume you are in the standard band. Companies House shows every filing date on the public register, free, and it takes about thirty seconds to look up your own company.

Working out your actual deadline

Your accounts are due 9 months after your accounting reference date — the date your financial year ends. If your year end is 31 March, your accounts are due by 31 December.

Your first set of accounts is different. You get 21 months from the date of incorporation, which is usually longer than nine months from your first year end. A lot of first-time directors work from the nine-month rule and think they are late when they are not. If this is your first filing, check the incorporation date before you panic. It only applies once — from your second set onwards you are on the standard nine months after your year end.

Public companies get 6 months rather than 9.

Can you get an extension?

Almost never, and not in the way people hope. Companies House does not grant individual extensions because you are busy, ill, waiting on an accountant, or short of information.

There is one legitimate route, and it only works before the deadline passes: you can apply to change your accounting reference date, which moves your year end and therefore your filing date. You can only extend an accounting period once every five years, and it is not a fix for a deadline that has already gone.

If your deadline has passed, that door is closed. Your only useful move is to file as quickly as possible and stop the clock before the next band.

How you actually file, now that WebFiling has gone

This is the part that trips people up in 2026, and it is why a lot of advice you will find online no longer works.

Companies House WebFiling for annual accounts closed on 31 March 2026. The joint HMRC and Companies House filing service, CATO, closed on the same day. If you filed your last set of accounts through either of those, that route no longer exists.

Accounts must now go through commercial accounting software that supports direct submission to Companies House. If you do not already have software, this is the thing to sort out first, because it is the step that takes the longest when you are trying to file at short notice.

Your accounts are not filed until they are accepted

Submitting is not the same as delivering. Accounts only count as delivered once they meet the requirements of the Companies Act and are accepted onto the register. If they are rejected for any reason — wrong period, missing signature, a format problem — the clock keeps running as though you never filed.

That matters most when you are close to a band boundary. Filing on day 30 with an error that bounces back on day 33 puts you in the £375 band, not the £150 one.

Appealing a penalty

You can appeal, but the grounds are narrow. Companies House considers whether something genuinely exceptional and outside your control prevented filing — a fire destroying records days before the deadline is the sort of example that gets cited.

What does not usually succeed: your accountant was slow, you were ill, you did not receive a reminder, the company is dormant, you could not afford the fee, or you did not know the deadline. None of those are treated as exceptional.

Appeals can be made online through GOV.UK or by email to Companies House. If an appeal is rejected, it can be escalated to the Senior Casework Unit and, after that, to the Independent Adjudicators.

Appealing does not pause the penalty. If you are going to file, file — then appeal separately if you have real grounds.

Two other things worth knowing tonight

Your confirmation statement is a different filing again. Late accounts get you a financial penalty. A missed confirmation statement can put the company at risk of being struck off, which is a considerably worse outcome. If you have lost track of one deadline, check the other while you are looking.

Identity verification, if you have not done it

Since 18 November 2025 identity verification has been mandatory for new directors and people with significant control. Existing directors and PSCs are in a transition period with a deadline of November 2026.

This is a separate obligation to filing accounts, but it can get in the way of one. If the director who needs to approve or submit a filing has not verified, that can cause problems with related Companies House filings. If you are already dealing with a late filing, it is worth confirming your verification status at the same time rather than discovering it later.

What to do, in order

1. Look up your company on the Companies House register and confirm the actual deadline and your filing history. Free, thirty seconds, and it tells you whether the doubling rule applies to you.

2. Work out which band you are in today and how many days until the next one. That number is your real deadline.

3. Check you have filing software, because WebFiling is gone and this is the step most likely to cost you days.

4. File. Even incomplete-feeling accounts that are correct beat perfect accounts filed three weeks later in a higher band.

5. Deal with the penalty afterwards. Pay it or appeal it, but do not let it delay the filing — the penalty stops growing when the accounts are accepted, not when you start arguing.

Where to get help

If the company is in financial difficulty as well as behind on filing, that is a different and more urgent problem — speak to a licensed insolvency practitioner or a free debt advice service before anything else. If you simply need the accounts prepared, an accountant can usually turn a straightforward set around quickly, and the fee is often less than the difference between two penalty bands.