How to Register Your Business in Nigeria

Register  Business:Would you like doing business in Nigeria? If yes, you have to register your business in Nigeria with the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC). CAC is an Agency authorized by the Company and Allied Matters Act 1990 to register businesses operations in Nigeria.

If you want to do legitimate business in Nigeria, then you must register your business.

This is the requirement of the law in Nigeria.

You can register your business all by yourselves without the need of a Lawyer.

However, it depends on the size of your business.

The types for business registration in Nigeria are:

(a) Business Name Registration

(b) Private Limited Company (LTD)

(c) Public Limited Company (PLC)

(d) Company Limited by Guarantee (LTD/GTE)

(e) Unlimited Company (ULTD)

(f) Incorporated Trustee

Business Name and Private Limited Company are the two most popular and most relevant to small and medium scale Entrepreneurs in Nigeria. This will be our focus in this article.

Benefits of business registration

There are other great benefits of registering your business apart from the requirement of the law. These are:

1. Business registration helps you secure your company name before someone else takes it.

For instance, people try both their first and second choice name without considering the stress one go through for the name search.

You should not toil with it. Therefore, early registration helps secure your choice name.

2. It shows seriousness and authenticity to your business.

When your business is registered, you feel more responsible and work harder towards establishing your business and brand.

Also, it makes you feel like a serious business person and Increases your drive towards success.

For instance, When Palness Media was just a name, I used to make mention of it only as a mere formality.

I didn’t take serious claim to it, even though businesses were being carried out with the name.

Nevertheless, when it becomes a registered business, everything changed.

It became more serious and better organized.

3. Once your business is registered, you can open a corporate account with your business name.

There a lot of benefits of having a corporate current account. For instance, it makes people feel more comfortable to transact business with you.

Having known the importance of registering your company.

How do you proceed to register your business in Nigeria?

There are simple steps to get your business registered but sometimes can be very tedious due to our system.

The useful steps on how you can go about it without much tears are:

Step 1

Go to the Corporate Affairs Commission Office nearest to you and submit your business name for Name Search.

You should walk into the place and obtain the CAC Form 1 for about N200

Make sure that you fill the form correctly in CAPITAL LETTER – fill your name, your address and the Names you intend to register.

Also, tick the type of company category you want to register as.

Select from option one and two – Option one is your first-choice name, while option two is the alternative name in case the first choice is not available.

Ensure that you make a copy of the filled form before submitting it.

The photocopy is what you will bring back to be used to locate your form.

After submitting the original document, go back in three days to check if your name is available.

If your name is not available, you will have to repeat the process all over again until you find one that is available.

Note: popular phrases lead to 99% possibility of not having it available.

Select something unique and uncommon.

Step 2

Register your business:If you checked and your name is available, start the registration process immediately.

Get the Business Name registration form for N250 (as at February 2013) and fill it.

For Limited Company registration, you will buy the set of Company Incorporation forms for N500.

You can find the detailed requirement for Incorporated Trustees Under Part C of CAMA No.1 of 1990.

Make sure that you ask someone there to assist you in filling the form if you are confused about what to fill in those forms.

Business name is not difficult.

Limited Liability can be quite challenging.

However, someone there can just be of help as long as you have provided all the requirements as contain in CAMA 1990.

Read also:How To Start Bitter Kola Export Business In Nigeria

Step 3

Ensure that the Federal High Court or State High Court attest the completed form. It cost N250 but if you do not know your way, those guys will short change you. Therefore, when you get there, ask for where you can do attestation.

Once you are done with that, return back to Corporate Affairs Commission office and submit your completed and attested forms.

Here, the first person will view it and sign on it and ask you to pass it to the next person who will type it into the computer and print it out for you to see and make corrections if necessary.

Go to UBA Bank and make your final payment for the registration.

The account usually attached to all the CAC offices.

You do not need to go elsewhere to make the payment.

Once all these have been successfully fulfilled, your business will be up for registration and certification.

As for Business Name – Proceed to CAC office for your Certificate after 8 working days or thereabout.

For Limited Company, your certificate will be sent to you once it is ready.

If you need a complete business plan, please let us know.

Or, you want us to help you set up this business, kindly contact us.

Otherwise, Please check out these other business ideas you can do 

Be sure to share it with your friends on Social Media, if you like this article.