You might be looking for how you can self-register a business on the Nigeria Corporate Affairs Commission, also known as CAC. I will take you through how to do that quickly and briefly, and I will point out the prerequisites you need to have in place before you can register your business on CAC as a Nigerian.
Prerequisites
You need to first check the CAC database to find out if nobody else’s business is bearing the name you have in mind. If you want to know how to do that, check this post which fully outlines how to cross-check if a business name is available for free and hasn’t been taken by somebody else on the CAC platform.
Visit the Official CAC Website
Visit the official website of the Nigerian CAC.
Go to Online Registration
Go below the first image you see, which is an image of the physical version of the CAC in Nigeria. You’ll see two buttons: “Public Search” and “Online Registration.” Click on the Online Registration, and you will be redirected to the new Company Registration Portal by Corporate Affairs Commission for the Federal Republic of Nigeria. This platform is an AI-driven platform created by the CAC to help business owners register their business as quickly as possible while making it easy to access and get results as soon as possible.
Create an Account
When you land on the homepage of the ICRP, go below. You’ll see a section after “Public Notices”. Below that you will see some enlisted buttons.
If you want to register as an agent, click on this button. But if you’re an average citizen who just wants to register your business on the CAC, go below.
After the accredited agents section, you see an account creation section. It says you must have an account registered before you can register or manage your business name or company. That section which says “account creation” with a “create account” button is where an average citizen in Nigeria must create an account first on the new CAC’s ICRP platform.
When you click on it, you’ll be redirected to another page where you have to select either a public user, accredited agent, or entity account. Because the client I am creating this for is average person or public user, select “public user.”
Note: Any member of the public can create an account. You will be a director, trustee, or proprietor/partner during the registration process. You only have access to Pre-Incorporation services as a public user. Provide all the necessary details to proceed.
Verify Your Account
After you successfully create an account, you will be asked to verify your account by the email address you submitted. Then you will be redirected to your account dashboard.
Start New Reservation
On your account dashboard, you have different sections with information about name reservations you’ve made. On the new CAC ICRP platform, business name registrations are also known as reservations because you have to do a reservation before it is approved for registration by the administrators. On the dashboard, look below and you will see a section that says “new reservation.” Click on it.
I am going to be using a client name which a client gave us to go through this guide, and the name of the business for this client is called “God-Blessed Autos”
Complete Business Details
After clicking on New Name Reservation, it will take you to a page for name reservation. Before you state the name you want to reserve, you have to state what kind of business it is, the type of business it is, and the classification of business it is.
Business Classification:
- If it’s a business name, choose “business name”
- If it’s a company you’re operating, choose “company”
- If it’s a limited liability partnership firm, choose “limited liability partnership”
- If it’s a limited partnership firm, choose “limited partnership”
For our client business name, I will select “Company.”
Company Type:
After you select your business classification, you have to select your company or business type:
- Private company limited by shares
- Private unlimited company
- Public company limited by shares
- Public unlimited company
For our client here, I’ll be selecting private company limited by shares.
After that, you fill in other information about your business, such as your business category and the nature of your business. Note: If you select private company limited by shares, you have to put “limited” in full or by abbreviation after your business name.
Check Business Name and Details Validity
Hit “Check Validity” and this basically checks if the business name, company name, or firm name you’ve mentioned is available in their database.
Payment Process
After that, you can click on “continue to payment” and it’s going to load how much it’s going to charge you for the name reservation. The standard fee which the CAC charges for the reservation of name is just 500 Naira. This is usually exploited by agents who, when you reach out to them to register your business through this process, will charge as much as 50,000 naira or more. But if you do it yourself, you save yourself 99% in costs.
After clicking on “Payment,” you’ll be taken to the payment platform with the RRR. Copy the RRR and save it somewhere just in case.
Payment Options Available:
After clicking on REMITA, you’ll be redirected to pay with either:
- Card
- Bank Transfer
- USSD
- eNaira
- Bank Branch
- Remita
- Wallet
- Phone Number
- Internet Banking
- Bank Account
I will pay for our client with a bank transfer as this is a very swift means to make payment online these days. Once you do that, you will see something related to “verify and proceed.” Click on that.
Wait for Confirmation
Wait for a while here for it to load. Don’t be in a hurry to get off this payment gateway page. Just be patient until you see “your transaction was successful.”
Once you see your transaction successful, also wait and be patient until it takes you to another page as you’ll be redirected shortly.
Check Your Dashboard
The redirect will take you back to the dashboard where you can see what you’ve already put in – the proposed name and all the other information.
If it doesn’t take you there, make sure you go to your dashboard and click on the “Pending” tab to see if it is actually what you put. Sometimes you may not even see it there. What you need to do is reload the page to be sure that it’s there.
If you come back to this page and you don’t see pending – you see zero – check your “denied” or check “reserved.” In some cases, they’ll probably send you an email, but if they don’t send you an email and you check back, make sure to check your denied or reserved sections.