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Guidance

Community Interest Companies Guidance

Comprehensive information for those people who want to form a community interest company (CIC), other stakeholders and those giving professional advice about CICs.

Updates to this page

From:
Office of the Regulator of Community Interest Companies
Published:
2 August 2013
Last updated:
4 April 2025
Show all updates

  1. Updated guidance on Articles of Association schedule 3

  2. Converted PDF guidance to HTML

  3. Update list in annex c

  4. All guidance chapters were updated to show the new parent department name and logo, Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy.

  5. Legislation links in Chapter 1 updated.

  6. Updated office address in all publications

  7. Chapter 7 of guidance notes updated - amended heading 7.1.

  8. Foreword in chapter 1 of the guidance updated.

  9. Chapter 11 of guidance updated

  10. Updated Annex A of the guidance notes

  11. Chapter 6, 7 and Annex A of the CIC guidance notes have been updated to reflect the changes to the dividend and performance related interest caps that will take effect from 01 October 2014

  12. Section about public benefit entities added to chapter 8: statutory obligations

  13. First published.

Documents

Community Interest Companies Guidance

HTML

Details

This guidance explains what community interest companies (CICs) are and the steps that must be taken to form a CIC. It includes information on constitutional documents, restrictions on the transfer of assets (‘the asset lock’) and statutory obligations.

  • What is a CIC

  • Things to Consider

  • Asset Locked Body

  • Shares & Dividend Cap

  • Accounts & CIC34 Report

  • Regulator’s Role

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