Everything is public.
Most people read
one page of it.

Search by number, not name

Company names repeat and change. The 8-character company number is the only identifier that never moves. If you have an invoice or a contract, find the number on it and search by that. Searching by name alone is how people read the wrong company's record and draw comfortable conclusions from it.

The six places to read

• Overview. Status, incorporation date, SIC codes, registered office, next accounts due. The five-second health check.
• Filing history. Every document ever filed: accounts, confirmation statements, mortgages, resolutions. The dates alone show punctuality.
• Officers. Current and resigned directors and secretaries, with appointment dates. Click through for each person's other appointments.
• Persons with significant control. Who the company says owns or controls it. Follow the chain to the actual people.
• Charges. Security registered over the company's assets, who holds it, and whether it is outstanding or satisfied.
• Gazette notices (published separately at The Gazette). Strike-off notices, petitions and insolvency appointments, with dates.

How to read what you find

Read across the sections, not within one. A healthy overview page with CCJs in the filing history, or impressive accounts with a chain of dissolved companies behind the directors, is still a problem. The record only makes sense as a whole, and the timing matters: when each filing landed, when each officer resigned, when each charge was registered, in order.

What Companies House does not show you

The register does not connect the dots. It will not tell you that the accounts are trending down, that the director's history is a pattern, or that the combination of signals adds up to a risk rating. That is the analysis layer, and it is exactly what a Black Flag Alert profile builds on top of the same public record: the signals computed, the trend drawn, and the data quality stated for every figure.