What a registered company charge actually means

Recognition

Seeing "1 charge registered" against a company and not knowing what that means

Anyone who's looked up a business on Companies House's free register has probably hit the "Charges" tab and found it less informative than expected. There's a lender's name, a date, sometimes a filed document. There's rarely a loan amount, and never a current balance.

Why it happens

Registration is a legal filing requirement, not a credit report

When a UK company grants security over its assets (a debenture, a fixed charge, a floating charge), the law requires the charge to be delivered to Companies House within 21 days of creation (see gov.uk's guidance on registering a charge). Miss that window and the debt itself still stands, but registering late needs a court order, and an unregistered charge is void as security against a liquidator, an administrator or a creditor of the company (see section 859H of the Companies Act 2006). That 21-day rule is why almost every company with secured lending shows something on the register early in the facility's life. It's routine, not a warning sign.

How to actually read one

What the filing shows, and what it deliberately doesn't

• The charge holder's name. Usually the lender, sometimes a security trustee acting for a syndicate of them.
• The date created and the date registered. Not the same thing. A gap of a few days is normal; a much longer gap is unusual and worth noticing.
• Fixed or floating, or both. A fixed charge attaches to a specific, identifiable asset. A floating charge hangs over a class of assets that changes day to day (stock, debtors, cash) until it "crystallises" into a fixed charge on a triggering event such as insolvency. Most debentures include both.
• Whether it's marked satisfied. Filing a satisfaction (form MR04) once a debt is repaid is common practice but not compulsory, so an unsatisfied charge on the register doesn't always mean the debt is still outstanding. It sometimes just means nobody's filed the paperwork to say otherwise.

None of this includes the loan amount, the rate, the covenants, or a running balance. That detail sits in the private agreement between the company and the lender, not in anything Companies House publishes.

Specialist insight

A registered charge doesn't decide what a business can borrow next

This is the point most explainers skip. Seeing a charge on the register tells you a lender has security, not how much headroom is left, not whether the agreement blocks further borrowing, and not whether the existing lender would consent to a second facility. Usually more borrowing is possible. It depends on what's actually written into the agreement, not on the fact that a charge exists at all.

Decision helper

What actually settles the question

If a specific decision hangs on what a charge means for a specific business (whether you're that business or assessing it), read the underlying agreement, not just the register entry. A solicitor or adviser reviewing the actual document is the only reliable way to know what it permits, what it restricts, and what consent it would need. The public filing tells you a charge exists. It was never designed to tell you more than that.

Going deeper

This page covers the basics of reading one entry. These questions come up often enough to deserve their own answer:

• What makes a floating charge "qualifying"
• Which charge gets paid first when there's more than one
• What actually happens when a floating charge crystallises
• What "all assets" actually covers in a debenture
• What an intercreditor agreement settles between lenders
• What happens to a charge if the company becomes insolvent
• How to clear a charge off the register once it's repaid
• Calculate what unsecured creditors get from a floating charge
• Run your own figures through the full insolvency order of payment

Alternatives and limitations

If what you're really trying to work out is whether your own business can raise more finance despite an existing charge, this page is background only. Go to borrowing with an existing debenture for the practical answer, or see Data Sources for where every other figure on this site comes from.