Company status in South Africa: what CIPC labels mean

The legal basis

Section 82 of the Companies Act, 2008 deals with dissolution and removal from the register ¹. Where a company has been wound up and a court has made a final liquidation order, the Master must promptly file a certificate with a copy of the order ¹. The Commission may remove a company that has failed to file an annual return for two or more years in succession, or that appears to have been inactive for at least seven years ¹.

Section 83 says a company is dissolved as of the date its name is removed from the companies register ¹. An interested person may apply to the Commission to reinstate the registration ¹.

Status steps in the deregistration process

CIPC Practice Note 2 of 2011, published in the Government Gazette of 24 August 2012, set out the steps below ². Later notices have changed parts of the process, so read it as the historical baseline.

• Referred for deregistration: the status changes to in deregistration process and CIPC issues a CoR40.3 demand notice concerning an inactive company ².
• Response: 20 business days to object or file all outstanding annual returns ².
• Pending deregistration: with no objection, CIPC issues a CoR40.4 notice of pending deregistration ².
• Final deregistration: with no response in a further 20 business days, CIPC refers the entity for final deregistration and issues a final deregistration letter ².
• Reinstatement: any interested party may apply on form CoR40.5 ².

The 2025 compliance drive

On 7 February 2025, CIPC published Practice Note 1 of 2025 ³. It said entities with deregistration process status that had not filed beneficial ownership declarations and annual returns by 31 January 2025 would be finally deregistered without further notice ³. It stated that entities not compliant with beneficial ownership declarations are prohibited from filing annual returns ³. The note linked the step to an accurate register ahead of a Financial Action Task Force assessment ³.

Reinstatement since October 2025

Practice Note 3 of 2025, published on 3 October 2025, replaced Practice Note 1 of 2022 for online reinstatement applications on form CoR40.5 ⁴. CIPC will only reinstate companies and close corporations that were in business or had economic value at the time of final deregistration ⁴.

After a reinstatement application is processed and paid, the entity must file all outstanding annual returns, beneficial ownership declarations and financial statements or a financial accountability supplement within 30 business days ⁴. If it does not, it goes back to its previous deregistered status ⁴. Reinstatement court orders are uploaded free of charge, and an entity reinstated by court order that does not file is placed back into annual return deregistration ⁴.

Voluntary deregistration

A company may ask CIPC to deregister it where it has ceased business and has no assets, or where its assets are too small for liquidation to be reasonably probable ². A CIPC notice dated 21 November 2025 and published on 12 December 2025 deactivated the manual email channel for voluntary deregistration from the date shown on the CIPC website ⁵. After that date, applications may only be made through authorised electronic channels, and Practice Note 7 of 2012 no longer applies to them ⁵.

Status terms compared