Companies House Annual Monitoring Report 1 April 2015 – 31 March 2016 1. Introduction to be situated in Wales, England and Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland. The Companies House Welsh Language The company’s registered office address Scheme was prepared in accordance must be in the country where they have with section 21(3) of the Welsh stated that their registered office is to be Language Act and received the full situated. endorsement of the Welsh Language Board on 20 April 2010. A Wales company has the option of having a Welsh company name and This report covers the period from 1 Welsh name ending (i.e. cyfyngedig, April 2015 to 31 March 2016. cwmni cyfyngedig cyhoeddus) and can file statutory documents in Welsh. An Responsibility for the operation of the England and Wales company can have Welsh Language Scheme in Companies a registered office address in Wales House lies with Jane Bluff-Higgins, or England, but cannot have a Welsh Principal Policy Adviser. She has the company name or Welsh name ending support of the team of Welsh speakers and cannot file statutory documents in on day to day matters and a committee Welsh. that meets regularly to monitor progress and performance. 3. Compliance with the Welsh Language Scheme 2. Interpretation CH remains committed to complying “CH” means Companies House with its Welsh Language Scheme and from 1 April 2015 to 31 March 2016, “2006 Act” means the Companies Act achieved the following: 2006 3.1 The Welsh committee met quarterly “the Registrar” means the Registrar of (June, September and December 2015, Companies and March 2016) to ensure adherence to the CH Welsh Language Scheme “LLP” means Limited Liability and review progress against the Action Partnership Plan, which is attached to this report. Welsh service meetings were also held “Wales company/LLP” means a to consider the services offered to Welsh company or LLP, as defined by section speaking customers. 88 of the 2006 Act (as applied to LLPs), which has notified the Registrar that 3.2 A team of Welsh speakers from its registered office is to be situated in various areas within CH continued to Wales. On incorporation, a company respond to customer enquiries. Our must indicate if its registered office is Contact Centre received approximately 1 2 86,000 calls a month of which 3.6 We attended 2 external events in approximately 2 or 3 were Welsh calls. Wales during the reporting period, one They also received approximately Sterling Integrity event and a Business 30 Welsh emails a month out of Wales event, at which we provided approximately 54,500 emails. Welsh speakers and Welsh material. We also organised one legislative event and 3.3 In this reporting period, 46 Welsh three First Time Director events in Wales, speaking customers contacted us with at which we provided Welsh speakers queries, including: and Welsh material. In addition, we made requests for Welsh speaking • 41 general enquiries, such as volunteers to help at volunteer days, whether documents had been such as at the National Eisteddfod and received, how to access Welsh with local charities, like Cancer Research pages on GOV.UK, how to change Wales. director details, promise to file accounts and requests for paper 3.7 Customers continued to correspond forms to be sent out; with CH in Welsh and received a response in Welsh. Additionally, • 4 letters appealing against late filing companies could opt into our penalties. One letter commented bilingual service, where all automatic that the Late Filing Penalty manual correspondence is sent bilingually. This was only available in English but we facility is advertised in our guidance have since arranged for a Welsh Conducting Business in Welsh and version to go on GOV.UK; and on GOV.UK. 42 companies opted into our bilingual service in the reporting • One FOI request (see paragraph 3.9) period. At the end of the reporting period, approximately 1300 companies 3.4 We continued to make the most and 30 LLPs, out of a total register of commonly filed forms, which make up 3.68 million, had indicated that they 95% of filings on the register, available would like to receive automatic bilingual bilingually, both in paper form and correspondence. electronically. 3.5 All guidance created by CH was available bilingually, except that which is specifically not applicable to Welsh Companies (e.g. guidance on matters that affect only Scottish companies). 1 2 3.8 140 sets of Welsh language 3.13 We held a ‘Clwb Cymraeg’ weekly accounts were received from Wales during August for staff who wished companies, which is 58 fewer than to practice Welsh whilst classes were last year. Each of these accounts were suspended during the summer holidays. translated into English for the public record. CH is under a duty to 3.14 A local bookshop specialising in translate certain filings from Welsh into Welsh books and cards, came in during English. Additionally, we translated into the lunch hour on several occasions. Welsh approximately 100 other pieces to satisfy the requirements of our Welsh 3.15 We made the consultation on Language Scheme, 23 more than last changes to our statistics available in year. This included letters, guidance Welsh on GOV.UK. and project work, for the website and online services. We continued to use a 3.16 In June 2015, November 2015 and specialised translation software to help March 2016 we attended a committee of with providing consistent translation into central government departments based Welsh. in Wales. The purpose of this committee is to support the development of quality 3.9 We received one Freedom of Welsh language customer services Information request in the Welsh across central government departments. language and provided a Welsh response within the statutory deadline. 4. Mainstreaming the Welsh Language 3.10 Welsh speaking customers were kept up to date with filing deadlines, CH considered the Welsh language in events and other notices through our the following ways: website, bilingual correspondence and our Welsh twitter account 4.1 We have continued to consider our @TyrCwmniau. We had 3 ‘Tweets’ in Welsh services at the earliest stage of all Welsh which received Welsh replies. projects through the inclusion of Welsh in all project managers’ checklists and 3.11 All contracts issued included a other development plans. clause ensuring our service partners comply with CH Welsh Language 4.2 Throughout the period, CH, in commitments. conjunction with our parent department, the Department for Business Innovation 3.12 We publicised Welsh language and Skills, has been preparing for the events in the local area, for those implementation of the Small Business staff who may have had an interest in Enterprise and Employment Act. attending. 3 4 We have been developing our services 5.1 Frontline Services to account for the changes to our filing services as a result of the new Percentage and number of bilingual legislation, and the ability to file in staff: Welsh will be available. Measures were implemented on 10 October 2015 and CH Contact Centre 6 April 2016 and the final measures will be implemented on 30 June 2016. There are three full time and one part Guidance produced by CH will be made time bilingual staff in the Contact Centre. available in Welsh on GOV.UK. There is a contractual requirement that our supplier provides 2 Welsh speakers. 4.3 We have continued to increase Welsh language content on GOV.UK If a customer specifically asks to speak and have held discussions with the to a Welsh speaker and one is not Government Digital Service (GDS) to available, we offer the customer the continue to improve these services. choice of completing the call in English or request the customer’s contact 5. Performance indicators telephone number so that a Welsh speaker can contact them directly. In the reporting period, there were 12,627 Wales companies and 38 Public reception Wales LLPs incorporated. 611,372 companies and 8,453 LLPs in total were There are no bilingual staff at the CH incorporated during this period. reception. The staff are able to give greetings in Welsh and there is a By the end of the reporting period, there prominent sign advising visitors that a were 34,647 Wales companies and 278 Welsh service is available on request. Wales LLPs on the register, compared Reception staff have a list of Welsh to a total of 3,678,860 companies and speaking staff they can contact if a 60,181 LLPs. request is made. However, no visitors requested to discuss CH business in By the end of the reporting period, there Welsh during the reporting period. were 1,319 Wales companies and 17 Wales LLPs incorporated with a Welsh Telephone helpline name ending on the register. We continued to provide one dedicated external telephone number for Welsh speaking customers, which received 9 calls in the reporting period. The team of Welsh speakers was also available to deal with any Welsh enquiries. 3 4 5.2 Language Training and • The Advanced Level 4 class was Awareness held weekly and a joint class was held with the Proficiency Group Number of staff who received Welsh each month. No course book was Language training to a certified level followed by these groups as the of qualification: tutors prepared sessions based on the needs of the learners and CH offered six Welsh courses, run by the included work related scenarios, University of South Wales: Entry Level both written and spoken. There 1, Entry Level 2, Foundation Level 2, were 5 members of staff in the Advanced Level 1, Advanced Level 4 Advanced Level 4 Group and 9 and Proficiency.