What actually happened on 6 April 2026
Your society stopped existing as a legal entity. It did not become an unincorporated club automatically with everything intact. The incorporation that let it hold a bank account, sign a lease, hold insurance and own gear in its own name simply ended.
The immediate practical consequences
- Bank accounts in the society name can be frozen once the bank notices the removal.
- Grant funders and gaming trusts generally require a current registration; funding can be suspended or clawed back.
- Property owned by the society becomes ownerless and can pass to the Crown.
- Insurance taken out in the society name may not respond, because the named insured no longer exists.
- Committee members can be personally liable for obligations incurred after removal.
You have until 6 April 2032 to apply
Restoration is not a short window. A society removed for failing to reregister can apply to be restored to the register at any point before 6 April 2032. Only someone who was an officer or a member at the time of removal can make the application.
Why waiting is still expensive
The deadline is distant but the damage compounds. Every month a society sits removed is a month of frozen funds, lapsed insurance and personal exposure for the people on the committee. Restoration also gets harder to evidence as members disperse and records go missing.
Common questions
What is an incorporated society unable to do?
Once removed, it cannot hold property, enter contracts, sue or be sued, or operate a bank account in its own name, because it is no longer a legal person separate from its members.
Can an incorporated society be liquidated?
Yes. A society can be put into liquidation, and that is a different process from being removed for failing to reregister. Restoration applies to removal, not to a completed liquidation.
Does an incorporated society need to be audited?
Most small societies do not require an audit, but the 2022 Act introduced tiered financial reporting and some societies must now file to a standard they did not previously.
Societies this applies to
Real entries from the register, all removed without ever reregistering: