UK know-your-business
UK KYB API
Start a UK company check with a single entity request, then keep the evidence and its limits together in the workflow that uses it.
What it makes possible
A public-record check that keeps its provenance
The published entity response brings the Companies House company profile, people and control records, registered charges, officers, and insolvency proceedings into named response slabs. A caller can keep those records and the availability of each source in the same workflow object.
01
Resolve the legal entity
Search by name when you need a company number, then request the entity profile by that number. The profile carries the Companies House name, status, incorporation details, SIC codes, registered office, and filing-overdue indicators.
02
Review people and control
Use the officer and PSC slabs to place directors, corporate officers, and persons with significant control alongside the company record. Officers are active by default; resigned appointments can be requested when the history matters.
03
Make completeness machine-readable
Record sources_checked and sources_failed with the decision. A source that could not be consulted is visible in the response, so a downstream rule can request review instead of assuming a missing result is clear.
Response surface
Fields to put in the workflow
The response uses named slabs, stable enum values, and null or empty values instead of silently omitting fields.
- ch and ch_psc
- Company profile, filing status, registered office, SIC codes, and persons with significant control from Companies House.
- officers
- Active officers by default, with counts for active and resigned appointments plus a derived directors array.
- charges and insolvency
- Registered charge history and corporate insolvency case records, including tri-state status where a source was not available.
- sources_checked and sources_failed
- The attempted source set and the subset that could not be queried, both present on every entity response.
Interpretation
A partial response is still evidence
The entity response does not turn an unavailable registry into a blank success. sources_checked names every attempted source and sources_failed is the subset that could not be queried. Treat the successful sources as sources_checked minus the keys in sources_failed; use the failure detail to route the case for retry or review.
Review prompts
- Is this the active legal entity the applicant claims to be?
- Who is recorded as an officer or person with significant control?
- Do the returned records contain a current insolvency case, overdue filing, or live registered charge worth reviewing?
- Was every source needed for this decision actually consulted?
First request
Start with a company number
curl "https://api.rotuli.co.uk/v1/entity/00445790" \
-H "Authorization: Bearer uk_live_YOUR_KEY"The Free tier includes 500 requests per month with no card required. See the API reference for the full response schema and data sources for licence and freshness details.
Guide: look up a UK company by name or number