Trading Disclosures: What a Website Must Show

Trading Disclosures

Also called company information on website, website legal information

The company details UK law requires on your website, emails and documents: registered name, number, place of registration, office and VAT number.

Quick facts: Trading Disclosures

How trading disclosures work

Two sets of rules overlap. The Company, LLP and Business (Names and Trading Disclosures) Regulations 2015, made under the Companies Act 2006, set out what companies and LLPs must show and where. The Electronic Commerce (EC Directive) Regulations 2002 add requirements for any business that sells or promotes itself online, whatever its legal form.

For a company or LLP, the website must show:

the full registered name exactly as it appears at Companies House, including “Limited” or “Ltd”;
the company or LLP number;
where it is registered: England and Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland;
the registered office address.

The E-Commerce Regulations then ask for a geographic address where you can be reached, an email address, your VAT number if you have one, and details of any professional body or regulator you are registered with, such as the FCA or the SRA. A sole trader or partnership trading under a name that is not the owners’ own must show the owners’ names and an address for documents on letters, invoices and receipts, and the E-Commerce Regulations require the real name online too.

The rules apply to documents in electronic form as well as on paper, so order confirmations, invoices and business emails count. Most businesses meet them with a short block of text in the website footer and the same details in their email signature.

Why it matters

Failing to make the disclosures is a criminal offence for the company and for every officer in default, although in practice enforcement tends to follow a complaint or a dispute. The bigger cost is usually commercial. A customer about to pay a deposit, or a business vetting a new supplier, will often look for the company number and check it on the public register. A missing number, or a footer naming “XYZ Marketing” when the company is registered as something else, looks evasive at exactly the moment you need trust.

Clear disclosures also work as a trust signal in search. Google’s guidelines for its quality raters ask them to find out who is responsible for a website and how to contact them, and a site naming its company, number and address is easier to trust than an anonymous one. The details will not lift rankings on their own, but leaving them out can count against pages where people are spending money.

Common mistakes

Using the trading name instead of the registered name. You can trade as “Bright Kitchens”, but the footer must also give the registered company name, such as “Bright Kitchens (London) Ltd”.
Leaving out where the company is registered. “Registered in England and Wales” is easy to forget and is required.
Giving a PO box as the only address. The E-Commerce Regulations ask for a geographic address where you can be contacted.
Leaving old details live. After a change of registered office, a change of name or a new VAT registration, footers, email signatures and invoice templates often keep showing the old details for years.
Mixing up the registered office and the trading address. If the registered office is your accountant’s address, label it as such, and do not put it on your Google Business Profile as if customers can visit.

How to act on it

Look up your company on the Companies House register and copy the registered name, number and office address exactly. Then check four places: the website footer, the contact page, your email signatures, and your quote and invoice templates. Add your VAT number if you are registered, and the registration number of any regulator or professional body that applies to your sector.

Keep the details in one place on the site, usually the footer, so a change only has to be made once. If you are planning a website redesign, put trading disclosures on the launch checklist alongside the privacy and cookie pages. Footers are often rebuilt from scratch in a redesign, and these lines are among the first to disappear without anyone noticing.

Do and do not

Do

Copy the registered name, number and office address exactly from Companies House
Put the details in the footer and your email signature
Update every template when the registered office, name or VAT status changes

Do not

Show only your trading name
Give a PO box as your only address
Present a registered office address as premises customers can visit

Questions people ask about this

Do sole traders need trading disclosures on their website?

Yes, though fewer than a company. Under the E-Commerce Regulations a sole trader's website must give their name, a geographic address, an email address and a VAT number if registered. If you trade under a business name rather than your own name, your own name and an address for documents must also appear on letters, invoices and receipts.

Do I need my company number in my email signature?

Business emails are treated as business correspondence, so the safest approach is to include the registered name, company number, place of registration and registered office address in your signature. It adds two short lines and removes any doubt. Many businesses put the details in small text below the sign-off.

Can I use a virtual office or my accountant as my registered office?

Yes. Since March 2024 the registered office must be an "appropriate address", meaning post sent there will come to the attention of someone acting for the company and delivery can be recorded, so a PO box is not allowed. A virtual office or an accountant's address can meet that test. Just do not present it to customers as a place they can visit.