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Main Points to Remember

When filing the annual return, please remember that the signature page cannot be submitted prior to the upload of the financial statements. The signature page is in reference to the financial statements so the statements must be uploaded before the completion of the submission process. Everything must be filed on time or the company will face late filing penalties.

Signature pages must be printed off, signed and then physically sent to the CRO. It is not possible yet to upload signature pages to CORE.

If an annual return is non-compliant:

the return will not be physically sent back to the Presenter.  

An email will issue to the Presenter informing them that their document is sent back and    

they must resubmit their B1, re-upload their financial statements, print and sign a new signature page and deliver it to the CRO within 14 days.

Companies and Presenters should ensure that they provide the correct email addresses to ensure they are alerted when their documents are sent back as they will no longer receive a letter or documents by post.

B1’s are automatically rejected where the B1 signature page or overall certificate is not signed or if it has only one signature. The Registrar will not use her discretion under Section 898 of the Companies Act 2014 in these cases and does not allow 14 days for the amendment required.  A new annual return must be captured, financial statements uploaded and a new signed signature page delivered to the CRO. Where this new annual return is more than 28 days after the company’s Annual Return Date, the B1 form is late.     

Financial Statements must be uploaded prior to sending in a signed signature page to the CRO. If a signature page is received and there are no financial statements uploaded then this annual return is rejected. Companies are not given 14 days to upload the financial statements.

Payment must be made for an annual return online: 

The filing fee for an e-B1 is €20.   

Remember that if you have chosen to pay by credit card, payment will be taken immediately and is NON REFUNDABLE (as we cannot store card details). If you would prefer to pay by customer account, payment will not be deducted from your customer account until signatures are applied. Open a customer account online

Payment cannot be made by cheque/postal order/bank draft or cash. Payment must be made online. 

If an annual return is filed late, late filing penalties apply and, where applicable, the company also loses its entitlement to claim audit exemption in the following two years.

If you have chosen to sign electronically and pay with a customer account or by credit card, then the submission is entirely electronic, so no signature page or cover sheet is needed unless your are signing as an EFA. As EFAs cannot in law certify the accounts they must attach an overall certificate to the patch page and file it with the CRO on or before the annual return's due date.

TRACKING DOCUMENTS USING CORE: Workspace & Company Watch Facility 

When you submit a document online to the CRO through CORE (CRO’s online filing system) you can use your Workspace to track the status of all documents that you have submitted electronically. As the status of the document changes on the CRO system it also changes within the workspace e.g. sent back, received, registered etc. https://core.cro.ie/Home/FullHelp.

You can also put a watch on a particular company or companies that you are responsible for: https://core.cro.ie/Home/CompanyWatchRequestHelp.

Using both of these facilities will ensure that you know if your documents have been received into the CRO and whether they have been sent back for amendments. If a document is sent back you will also receive notification of the returned document by email. Please ensure that you have provided an up-to-date and monitored email address and also check your spam folder. The email address used is the one associated with your CORE account and can be checked or changed in CORE under your profile in Administration. Electronic documents are not returned by post.

My financial statements pdf is too large and won't upload to CORE. What can I do?

A: PDF files should not be more than 5 mb. If your file is too large perhaps consider removing pictures/images from the financial statements. Copy the required text to a new Word processing document. There are other alternatives if using other Word Processors like CUTEFTP. Click File, Save As PDF. 3. Click the Radio Button “Minimise Size” and “Compress Pictures. Compress Pictures will offer options  - the lower the resolution you choose - the smaller the size of the document. Click Ok and Save the Document as PDF.  Reducing size of pdf accounts.pdf

Certification by EFA

Where the B1 form is filed by an Electronic Filing Agent (EFA), the EFA cannot certify the financial statements of the company. In that case, the financial statements must be certified separately by a director and the secretary using a Financial Statements Certification sheet which must be attached to the B1-Financial statement certification sheet which must be attached to the B1 -   CERTIFICATE for EFAs filing Financial Statements.pdf

What do I need on my computer in order to file online?
A: In order to file online you will need to have the following:

A valid email address.

Adobe Acrobat 9 or greater on your computer.

Adobe acrobat is a free download from www.adobe.com . You will need to download this onto your computer before filing electronically.

A printer. 

Make sure that your printer is connected to your computer as you need to print out a signature page at the end of filing your form. 

Where can I get further information? 

For Electronic Filing Agents and mandatory e-filing see EFA information.    

Filing on CORE: https://core.cro.ie  

CRO website: https://www.cro.ie/Annual-Return/Filing-Electronically  

Filing through a software package website: Please contact your software provider

e-B1 Help Mailbox: eb1@dbei.gov.ie  

ROS (Revenue Online Service) https://www.ros.ie  

   

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