How to Check a Registered Company in Singapore

As a business owner, you might need to check if other companies are registered in Singapore for various reasons. One common reason for conducting due diligence would be to verify if potential business partners and suppliers are credible before entering into a partnership.

Why is it necessary to check a company’s credibility?

For business structures such as limited liability partnerships, verifying a company will be especially useful, as this enables business owners to verify the legitimacy of potential partners and avoid future fraud or severe financial consequences. This is also a way to safeguard your company from untrustworthy partners.

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How to verify a Singapore Registered Company?

To check if a company is registered in Singapore, you should conduct a due diligence check on ACRA. The Accounting and Corporate Regulatory Authority (ACRA) has a Singapore Registered Company List.

There are two foolproof ways of verifying if a company is registered in Singapore

1. ACRA’s company search tool
2. ACRA’s business profile function

Both functions provide you with 

1. Name of business entity
2. Registration number (UEN)
3. Operational status of business
4. Registered business address
5. Principal business activities

The additional information that the ACRA’s company search tool provides you with would be the

• Annual Returns (AR)
• Annual General Meeting (AGM)
• Financial Statements

However you would need to purchase the business entity’s profile if you require the

• company’s date of incorporation, 
• business type, and 
• information of position holders or business owners.

ACRA’s company search tool

The steps for using ACRA’s company search tool are as follows:

Step 1: Go to ACRA’s registry

Step 2: Enter the name or registration number (UEN) of the company you’d like to verify, then click ‘Search’

Step 3: You should then see the aforementioned information about the company

ACRA’s business profile function

To download the business profile of the company, follow the same steps as the ACRA’s company search tool, then click ‘Business Profile’.

After you make a successful payment, you will receive an email with a URL to download the report within 15 minutes.

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Using Rikvin’s company search tool

Alternatively, you can use Rikvin’s Singapore Company Name Registration Check tool if you only require simple information such as the 

• Company’s UEN, 
• Company name, 
• Company type, 
• Date of Incorporation, and 
• Company status.

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What information should I specifically look out for?

Operational status of business

The operational status of a business is a metric that indicates whether a company is fully operational or has ceased operations. All registered companies in Singapore are required to update their company status on a regular basis, and failure to do so could be a warning sign.

What you should look out for: ‘Live’ status
The "live" status indicates whether or not the company is currently operational. 

Registered business address

When verifying a company in Singapore, a valid registered business address is especially useful, as an incorrect or suspicious address will immediately raise a red flag. Check to see if their address is legitimate or just a mailbox. 

What you should look out for: A valid registered business address

Annual Returns (AR)

All companies are required to submit an annual report to ACRA within 30 days of the annual general meeting of shareholders under the Singapore Companies Act. 

What you should look out for: Date of the most recent filing and the financial year end (FYE)

Annual General Meeting (AGM)

Private companies may be exempted from holding AGMs or may elect not to hold AGMs altogether. 

What you should look out for: Public companies should have the AGM field filled with the date of its last held AGM. It should typically not be more than 1 year prior.

Financial Statements

Financial statements indicate whether or not the company has met all of the requirements and submitted their financial statements to ACRA.

What you should look out for: Thoroughly completed and filed financial statements

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How Rikvin can help you conduct due diligence

At Rikvin, we understand that checking the company profiles as well as the profiles of the numerous business owners, beneficiary owners and shareholders etc. might be laborious.

By engaging Rikvin’s services, we will do the required KYC (Know Your Customer) to screen your potential business partners for any signs of money laundering (ML) and terrorism financing (TF) risks.

For more information about Rikvin’s due diligence processes, click here.