"CAC REGISTRATION CAN LAND YOU IN JAIL IF YOU ARE NOT CAREFUL" - SEIMINIYIFA FRANKLIN MATTHEW

A Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) service provider, Seiminiyifa Franklin Matthew, has taken to his social media page to recount his experience as a seasoned CAC service provider. According to him, "CAC registration looks simple but is very legal, and if care is not taken. It can land you in jail."

Stated below is his experience

First, let me school you. You see, CAC Registration is divided into 2 phase. 

1. Pre-registration phase: This is when you want to register a fresh Business name, Company & NGO. In This phase. There is little or no risk at all. Just ensure you do not defraud anybody when you are paid to carry out registrations. The risk of going behind bars when a job goes sour is like  4%. 

2. The POST Incorporation phase: This has to do with everything you do after the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC)  has issued you a Certificate of Incorporation. Such as filing of annual returns, change of company name, change of director,  re-allotment of a company share, etc. You see this phase the risk of going behind bars is very high. For me, I'll say 90%. Here, I'll advise if you don't have a system to carry out a due diligence before executing any post incorporation services, please do not add this phase to their list of CAC services.  

To educate you how risky this aspects of CAC Registration could be. Let's me share my experience with you maybe it will further make sense to you. 

You see, last year, a Law Firm In Abuja served me a court paper 2 times. 

What happened? I’ll briefly share.

In June last year, a self-acclaim consultant to one popular aviation company here in Nigeria contacted my firm to file the aviation company's annual returns. 

It was a 20 years annual return. 

The information he gave when he reached out was that he’s a consultant to the aviation company, and so the company needed to clear their backlog of returns to enable them to transact business without any restriction. 

He gave the company reg number. 

I checked. 

Truly, the company records show that they are owing the commission 20 years of annual returns. 

I gave him the bill of 500K. 

A few minutes later, he paid 450K. 

Saying when the JOB is completed, he will balance up. 

Without due diligence, the next day, I began the filing of the returns. 

I filed for 4 years out of the 20 years, and CAC gave me a query to pay an additional fee of N5,000 through remita because it’s a big company with over 30M share capital. 

As an experienced agent. I moved to the remita website, and I made the payment for a year, 2021 to be precise and I uploaded the receipt back to CAC. The next day, CAC approved the returns for 2021 and issued me an acknowledgment letter.

While I was about to make the additional payments for the rest of the 3 years I have filed for, remita's website began ACTING up.  Immediately, I abandoned the JOB and got on another.  3 days later, I got a call from an unknown number and it was the company secretary, but a lawyer. Saying that she’s so so company secretary and the MD has ordered her to file the company annual returns, but from her findings, I have already done that for the year 2021 and it was an ILLEGAL FILLING and the company has vowed to prosecute the agent that did that illegal filing thus declaring a fake financial statement to the commission. 

As we began to talk. 

I told her who brought the JOB to me.

And I shared the contact of the person with her. 

As she dialed the number on her phone. She discovered it was the clearing and forwarding agent of the company, and he’s also a staff of the company, not necessarily a consultant to the company. 

We talk and talk. Got on several calls. Got on several emails just to salvage the issue. Yet the company remained bent on prosecution. 

I wrote to CAC for re-traction, and they told me to send a mail to the registrar's office which I did.  A few days later, I got a call from the registrar's office about a legal paper regards and the issue that was on their desk. 

I explained everything to the man that called, and how the issue happened.

On 2 different occasions, I got a letter from CAC through DHL delivered to my office on this same issue, and it was a tough time for me and my staff during that period. 

Men! I stood my ground.

Contacted my legal adviser. 

Contact a few colleagues in Abuja who are big shoes in the business of CAC registration. 

And we were able to salvage the issue in October. 

After this incident.

I tighten my system and structures. 

- I introduced a verification process into my system. 

- For every CAC post-incorporation work I want to do. I carry out a thorough verification to ensure it’s coming or authorized from the right source. 

- I request a valid means of ID. 

- Request for an authorization letter written on the company letterhead and signed by any of the directors. 

- Request for the figures of the Turnover and net Asset for the year they are filling for. 

- And I place calls to the director or to the proprietor of the company or business where necessary. 

This way, I am shading myself, and my business from this kind of occurrence again. 

You see if you are into CAC registration. Whether you are a certified agent or a service provider that’s making use of someone else’s agent portal. 

Please, be extremely careful when it comes to CAC post-incorporation services.

Before you carry out any post-incorporation JOB. I beg you, do your findings, and carry out verifications to ensure the deal is coming from the right source. 

 I love you so much that is why I am sharing this with you so you can be extremely careful. 

It’s my prayer that JOBs that will give you sleeplessness will never come to YOU.

Seiminiyifa Franklin Matthew is a seasoned CAC service provider. He is a Senior Partner and the CEO of Coach Franklin Consults. He has successfully registered over 6000 Businesses/Companies/NGOs, and trained thousands of youth on How to Register Businesses to generate income.