Business guidance

Retail & Consumer Goods

Biocides and Pesticides Authorisation

Get HSE CRD authorisation for biocidal and pesticidal products.

Retail & Consumer Goods

CLP Chemical Classification and Labelling

Classify, label and package hazardous chemicals under GB CLP.

Manufacturing & Engineering

Control and monitor air emissions

If your industrial activity releases pollutants to air, you need an environmental permit from the Environment Agency or your local authority, depending on its tier. The permit sets emission limits, monitoring and reporting duties, and operating without it or breaching it is an offence carrying up to five years in prison.

Food, Drink & Hospitality

Get authorisation for a water activity in Scotland (EASR)

In Scotland, any activity affecting surface water or groundwater, such as abstraction, engineering or discharges, needs SEPA authorisation, and doing it without one is a criminal offence. SEPA decides which of four risk-based tiers your activity falls into, from general binding rules to a permit.

Life Sciences & Pharma

Get authorised to manufacture medicines

Making finished medicines without a manufacturer's authorisation from the MHRA is an offence. To get one you need a Qualified Person, Good Manufacturing Practice and an MHRA inspection, and active-substance makers must register separately.

Healthcare & Social Care

Manage medicines and controlled drugs safely

Prescription-only medicines may be supplied or given only on a prescriber's direction or under a lawful patient group direction. Controlled drugs add rules on locked storage, registers and destruction, and a privately funded provider needs a Home Office licence to hold Schedule 2 stock.

Life Sciences & Pharma

Manufacture controlled drugs and run a safe pharmaceutical site

Making or handling controlled drugs needs a Home Office licence on top of your MHRA authorisation. Large-scale chemical synthesis also needs an environmental permit, and every site must control hazardous substances and keep its process equipment safe.

Life Sciences & Pharma

Meet your scientific research regulatory duties

Which duties apply depends on the research you do. Labs using hazardous chemicals or biological agents must control exposure under COSHH, and work with GMOs, protected animals, stored human tissue or ionising radiation each brings its own licence or notification.

Retail & Consumer Goods

MHRA authorisation for medicines and medical devices

Making, distributing or selling medicines or medical devices in the UK needs MHRA authorisation. Medicines need a marketing authorisation for each product, manufacturers a manufacturer's licence and distributors a wholesale dealer licence, while device makers register their devices; since 1 January 2025, authorisations cover the whole UK.

Life Sciences & Pharma

Which medicines manufacturing authorisation applies

To make or import finished medicines, you need a manufacturer's/importer's authorisation from the MHRA and a Qualified Person to certify every batch. Making active ingredients needs a separate MHRA registration, and controlled drugs also need a Home Office licence.

Tax & Finance

Check if you need to register for VAT

You must register for VAT when your taxable turnover passes the registration threshold in any rolling 12 months, or when you expect it to pass the threshold within the next 30 days alone. Under the first test, register within 30 days of the end of the month. Late registration brings penalties and backdated VAT.

Compliance & Legal

File your confirmation statement

File a confirmation statement every 12 months, within 14 days after your review period ends. Filing late is a criminal offence for the company and its officers.

Premises & Operations

Meet your business waste duty of care

Every business that produces, stores or disposes of waste has a duty of care under section 34 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990, and stays responsible after it hands the waste on. Use only registered waste carriers, complete waste transfer notes correctly, and follow the stricter rules for hazardous waste.

Compliance & Legal

Verify your identity for Companies House as a director or PSC

Yes, if you are an individual director or PSC of a UK company, or an individual director of an overseas company registered in the UK. Corporate directors and officers of corporate PSCs are not yet required to verify. The transition for existing directors and PSCs ends on 17 November 2026.