The Registrar of a HK business registration company is a person who is responsible for maintaining the company’s register, keep it up-to-date and to register the documents of Company formation Hong Kong. The Registrar possess the power to accept or reject any document and demand information from members of the company for the verification of their data in companies register. In some cases, a person can demand the Registrar to appear at Court to provide valid reasons for rejecting the documents. So, there are many duties of a Registrar and in this article we are going to have a deeper look at how the Registrars do the HK business registration of documents and maintain the company’s register.

Substandard Documents for a HK business regitration

Following is the procedure that needs to be followed, if the registrar suspects anything wrong in the documents consisting of Company formation Hong Kong matters:

• A document will be considered substandard or unsatisfactory if:
• The information on the document is not readable.
• It has some other language other than English and Chinese.
• The requirements demanded are not attached with it. (discussed below)
• It is not delivered in accordance to Section 33
• Application requirements of the ordinance is not delivered with it.
• The fee issues need to be paid for the document, is not attached.
• Any surplus signature is printed on the document.
• The information present of it is internally inconsistent.
• Information present on it is driven from invalid source or without the company’s consent.
• Contains information contrary to law.

Here the judgment of the documents is done on the basis of, content, form, authentication and the manner of delivery of the document.

Requirements specified by the Registrar

Registrar may demand specific requirements for above documents registration. Following are few requirements that can be demanded by the Registrar:

• Documents that are under the ordinance, has to:
• Specify requirements for the registrar to make copies
• Specify requirements for authentication of a document.
• Specify requirements for the manner of delivery
• Those documents that are delivered to the registrar under the section 41 must specify requirement as:
• The deliverance of the documents, should be in a form, to associate it with the document containing the error.
• Identify the documents containing errors.
• For the above sections, the registrar may demand, different requirements for different documents and different circumstances,
• The registrar may ask for authentication of a specific person or a company.
• The registrar may require documents
• In Hard form
• In Electronics form
• To be delivered by post or something else
• If the document is delivered through electronic mean, than hard from proof is required
• This section does not allow the registrar to:
• Require a document to be delivered by the electronic means
• to specify any such requirement that is inconsistent with any requirement that is prescribed by an Ordinance.

Agreement of delivery by electronics means:

The registrar might enter into an agreement that he/she will provide any document that is related to the company, and is required to be delivered to the registrar, under the ordinance:

• Will be delivered by electronic means.
• Will follow the requirements those are specified in the agreement or by the registrar, according to the ordinance.

He may specify a default form of agreement and delivery method.

Power to accept or reject a document

Those documents will be refused, if the registrar believes the document under the ordinance is unsatisfactory. He may reject it or use his power to check for authentication. He may also advice a few requirements with it. The document need to be delivered in a satisfactory way, to get the approval.

He may also withhold the documents’ registration, to check its authentication, the mode of its deliverance, the person who delivered it or ask to produce any other document, that in the opinion of the Registrar might necessary to determine the question as to whether the document is unsatisfactory, and to apply to court for any order that the Registrar thinks necessary.

Appeal against the decision

If a person wants to appeal against the Registrar, than he should do it within 42 days after the decision and the court may ask for a cost for it.

Registrar Power in keeping Companies Register

Resolve inconsistency with Company’s Register:

Registrar may demand company to resolve the issue of inconsistency with Companies Register. This will happen if the documents contain inconsistent information and the information in the document and company’s register doesn’t match. The Registrar may demand the required proof regarding these document. If the company fails to do this, than the company and responsible persons will commit an offence and liable to a fine of level 5 and, repeating offence can result in a fine of $1,000 for each day.

Verifying and Updating information in Company’s Register:

To check whether the information of a person is accurate in the company’s register or to update it, the Registrar may demand the person to send information within some prescribed period and failing to deliver in the specified time will result in a offence and liable to a fine of level 5 and continuing offence will cost daily $1,000.

Rectifying clerical or typographical error in Company’s Register

The registrar may rectify error in the company’s register on his own or may ask to the company for correction. Registrar can also rectify it while registering it. The Court on the request of any person, may demand the Registrar to rectify or removes information from the company’s register or to rectify the document by registering it, but this does not apply when it is related to some other ordinance.

The Court should not order or try to prevent order for the removal of data from the registers. If the order is being made on removal or rectification of the data, a consequential order should be made by the court.

If an order is being made by the court, than a copy of it must be submitted to the registrar, from the applicant.

Appearance of Registrar in Court

In any sort of proceedings, according to above discussion, in front of the court, the registrar has to be appeared in the court or must send a representative and be heard or must appear if it is the court’s order. A written signed application must be submitted to the registrar, whether he appears in the trials or not, that application should contain all the data related to the proceedings, and the information he/she knows about this. This statement, will be considered as an evidence, and when investigated and resulted in some unsatisfactory results, than the registrar will be held accountable for it too.

Registrar may also interpret the company’s registers, he may take notes in it, to provide with the rectified information and for the ordinance’s purpose, notes must be made according to the above section. He may also remove a note, if it is no more valuable.