Two business service firms fined for flouting Companies Act
Sign up now: Get ST's newsletters delivered to your inbox
Business service firms Data Register and its associated company, Singapore Data Register, were fined a total of $4,500. They were guilty of failing to have their office open to the public on three days in 2018.
LIANHE WANBAO FILE PHOTO
Two business service firms - Data Register and its associated company, Singapore Data Register - were convicted and fined a total of $4,500 by the State Courts on June 4 for breaches under the Companies Act.
The Accounting and Corporate Regulatory Authority (Acra) said in a statement yesterday that Data Register, formerly known as Company Register, had pleaded guilty to one charge of failing to hold its annual general meeting in 2017, one charge of failing to file annual returns, and three charges of failing to have its registered office open to the public on three days in July and August 2018. A further six charges for the same breaches were taken into consideration by the State Courts for sentencing.
Data Register was fined $3,000.
Singapore Data Register, which shares the same registered office as Data Register, also pleaded guilty to three charges of failing to have its office open to the public on the same three days in 2018. A further four charges for the same breach were taken into consideration. Singapore Data Register was fined $1,500.
Acra said Data Register and Singapore Data Register pursued businesses subscribing to their services to make payments for outstanding fees.
"By failing to keep its office open to the public, Data Register and Singapore Data Register would have denied these subscribers the means to visit the companies' office to make inquiries, settle payments in person, or serve legal process," the authority said.
Acra had previously brought a total of 1,104 charges against Data Register for failing to display its company name and registration number in 139,833 business letters mailed out in October and November 2013.
People mistakenly assumed that the letters were from Acra and that they needed to provide the information asked for.
In May 2016, Data Register pleaded guilty to a total of 500 charges and was subsequently fined $200,000.
In November 2013, Acra said an entity calling itself the Singapore Company Register had requested companies to verify their details with it, but Acra had "no links whatsoever" to the entity and was investigating the matter.
Acra said then that letters by the Singapore Company Register claimed that companies which failed to verify their details would have their information deleted from the "Singaporean Company Register database" within one or two weeks of the date of the notice.
Company Register changed its name to Data Register in December 2013, about a month after Acra's alert.
Subsequently in January 2014, Acra issued another alert against Data Register for seeking payment from companies for its "subscription services".
Media reports noted that Data Register had requested companies to pay $490 for supposedly using its "services".
THE BUSINESS TIMES