ASIC Fees for Company Searches to Be Removed from Sept 2023

According to the announcement in the 2022-23 federal budget papers, fees traditionally paid to the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) for company searches on its website will be removed from September 2023, when the new "Australia's Business Registers" online platform is due to go live.

The Australian government will surrender $65 million in revenue associated with annual company registration, including dumping the controversial search fees charged to consumers seeking information about businesses. This brings Australia into line with countries such as the US and Britain, which have long made company information freely available.

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Search fees – which start from about $40 for a document – have long been criticised by transparency advocates as creating an obstacle to conducting due diligence on companies, especially privately owned firms not listed on a public sharemarket and subject to continuous disclosure obligations.

Their removal will be welcomed by investors, activists and journalists, who have been saddled with significant costs when making requests for routine information such as company ownership and legal structures, office addresses and financial results.

It is understood that "retail searches" – those conducted by individual citizens or businesses such as media providers or prospective company partners or buyers – will be free on the new "modernised" platform.

The government has not yet announced the commercial terms for "wholesale searches" made by businesses such as credit agencies and data providers who provide company information as a core service. Treasury has received expenditure of $300,000 to redesign the wholesale business search process.

The scrapping of company search fees comes as part of the Commonwealth's Deregulation Agenda, under which ASIC will forgo $64.9 million over three years from 2023-24.

The budget documents also revealed that companies would no longer be subject to an annual late review fee, and the fees paid by business for "ad hoc lodgements" will be reduced.

Separately, $11.2 million has been pledged over five years from 2021-22 to "reduce the regulatory burden" for companies complying with safety and information standards under consumer law, and the attorney-general's department will receive $1.4 million to develop a national approach to modernising common legal documents.

Source: Financial Review