The Office of the Registrar of Companies (ORC) has commenced the process of deleting 513,338 names of businesses, which have defaulted in the renewal of their certificates from its Register.
This exercise is in line with Section 5A (2) of the Registration of Business Names Act, 1962 (Act 151) on Annual Renewals, which reads: “Without prejudice to any other liability prescribed by this Act, a registration which is not renewed in accordance with this section shall LAPSE and the Registrar may remove from the Register the Business Name of the person whose Registration has lapsed after the expiration of the period prescribed for the renewal.”
“What this means is that, failure to renew a Business Name (Sole Proprietorship) or a Subsidiary Business name for a period of 3 months after the year has ended, leaves the name open to be used by anyone interested in the name.
“Therefore, to avoid such Business Names falling into the public domain, and for anyone of interest to use it after it has been struck off the Business Name Register, all Business Name Owners are entreated to renew their Business Names before the end of April, 2023,” a statement issued in Accra yesterday said.
It said Business Name Owners can be in good standing by renewing their business name through the short code *222#, and follow the prompt to make payment on the Ghana.Gov payment platform with their Mobile Money (Momo) wallet, or walk into our Offices across the country and make payment at our in-house Fidelity Bank.
“The ORC urges the general public to avoid the use of intermediaries and agents when transacting business with it, and ignore all calls or text messages from fraudsters purporting to be ‘lawyers’ or staff of the Office and demanding Mobile Money transfers in order to put their businesses in good standing.
“Kindly note that the Office does not have nor operate a Mobile Money Account or have designated any lawyer for that purpose,” it added.
