knowledge 4 December 2025 |

Should your directorship follow you home? Consultation on amendments to the Companies Act

The Companies Act 2014 requires companies to maintain a Register of Directors and Secretaries which includes the “usual residential address” for each director and secretary.  That information is provided to the CRO as part of various ongoing filings, and is made publicly available by the CRO.

The DETE's consultation paper is largely informed by the Company Law Review Group’s October 2025 recommendations, and proposes the following:

• Allowing directors and secretaries to provide a “contact address” for inclusion on the company’s Register of Directors and Secretaries (and the company’s Register of Members (if the officer is also a member) – that address must be located in the State. The contact address would be the only publicly published address (by the company and by the CRO) for that officer, and would also serve as the appropriate address for the service of documents.
• Maintaining the requirement that companies file the usual residential address of each company officer with the CRO. However, access to this address would be restricted to relevant entities prescribed by the Minister of Enterprise, Tourism and Employment or as otherwise sought by court order.  The proposed list of relevant entities (on page 9 of the consultation paper) is aligned with those who have unrestricted access to the CRO’s Register of Beneficial Ownership of Companies and Industry and Provident Societies.
• Revoking the Companies Act (Section 150) (No. 2) Regulations 2015, which currently allow a relevant officer to apply (with an accompanying letter of support from An Garda Síochána) to the Registrar of Companies to withhold their usual residential address from publication on the Register on the ground of personal safety or security.

If adopted, the proposals would not have retrospective effect and would only apply from the date the changes come into law, with the effect that residential addresses would remain publicly accessible when viewing previous filings with the CRO.

The DETE plans to take a similar approach for:

• directors and secretaries of co-operative societies in the Co-Operative Societies Bill,
• individuals who act as limited partners or general partners in limited partnerships in the Registration of Limited Partnerships and Registered Business Names Bill, and
• individuals who apply to register business names (again in the Registration of Limited Partnerships and Registered Business Names Bill).  Both of those bills are at ‘general scheme’ stage.  The General Schemes of both Bills closely mirror relevant provisions of the Companies Act relating to the usual residential address of relevant officers.

The consultation remains open until 5pm on 19 December 2025, with submissions welcome on the. Further information can be found on the DETE website.