Having a Company Secretary as part of Legal Compliance
ACRA stipulates that every company must appoint a company secretary within 6 months of its incorporation. The company secretary will be the primary officer in charge of numerous administrative and reporting responsibilities a company is required to adhere to by law. These statutory requirements include the filing of annual return, and recording and filing of board resolution.
Typically, companies engage the services of a corporate secretarial firm in Singapore to provide them with corporate secretarial services. A corporate secretarial firm will provide the hiring company with a named company secretary.
Who can be a Singapore Registered Company Secretary
Stated in Section 88 of the Companies (Amendment) Act 2014, every registered company in Singapore must appoint one or more Company Secretaries. The Company Secretary must be:
- A Natural person, and
- Resident of Singapore.
This section also states that the directors of a company, when appointing a Secretary must ensure that the Secretary has the requisite experience, academic and professional qualifications.
A company cannot appoint a person as a Company Secretary if that person has a debarment order against him or her by the Registrar, on the date of appointment. The Registrar can debar a Secretary who is in default of any of the relevant sections of the Act.
If the company has a sole director, that sole director cannot be appointed as a Company Secretary. The position of both Director and Company Secretary can only be held if there are more than 1 Director in the Company.
The office of the Secretary must not be left vacant for more than 6 months at any time. Most business owners would appoint a Company Secretary at the same time when incorporating their company.
You may appoint Leftright Corporate as your company secretary.
Duties
Here are the various responsibilities and roles of a company secretary that ensure legal compliance for your company.
- Director’s Resolutions in Writing pertaining to matters such as opening bank accounts, registered office, interim dividend, loan facility, etc
- Annual General Meeting including application for extension to hold the Annual General Meeting of the company
- Submission of statutory returns with the Registry of Companies
- Updating of statutory records
- Monitoring the filing deadlines of the statutory returns with ACRA
- Attending to auditors
- General corporate secretarial consultation
- Change of company name
- Change of principal activities
- Change of articles of the MAA
- Filing of Financial report in XBRL format with ACRA
- *New: Maintain, and update ACRA on the Register of Registrable Controllers (RORC)Updated: December 2020
In a nutshell
The roles and responsibilities of the company secretary might seem easy but there are definitely various regulations and legal requirements involved. Thus, it is highly important that the position is filled by someone who is able to handle of the requirements and keep all records accurately. In Singapore, it is a viable option to seek the services of professional accounting and legal consultants who would be able to undertake the role of company secretary. They would to provide consulting services to clients for updated knowledge on the requirements of any company secretary in Singapore.
Contact us to learn more about our corporate secretarial services.
Otherwise, to learn more about how Leftright Corporate can help you as your Company’s Registered Company Secretary, please click here.
