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Software-only filing is coming — Diligent Entities as a means to submit financial statements

September 29, 2025
2 min read
Diligent Entities Software-only filing iXBRL
April Skipp

April Skipp

Company Secretarial SME and Product Compliance Advisor

From 1 April 2027, Companies House will require all financial statements to be filed digitally via software, using iXBRL tagging — a major shift introduced under the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Act.

While this change affects how companies prepare and submit accounts, it doesn’t have to disrupt your existing processes. In fact, if your financial statements are already prepared and tagged, Diligent Entities offers a simple, secure way to submit them — without needing to overhaul your workflow.

What’s changing

The move to software-only filing means companies must:

  • Prepare iXBRL-tagged financial statements
  • Submit them via filing software

Most accounting teams already use software that supports iXBRL tagging. But submission is a different story — and that’s where governance matters. Traditionally, the Company Secretarial team manages the submission process, ensuring board approvals are documented, authentication codes are protected, and corporate legal compliance is tracked. These governance controls sit naturally with the Company Secretarial team.

Diligent Entities: Purpose-built to support good governance

Diligent Entities provides direct submission of iXBRL-tagged financial statements to Companies House, well ahead of the 1 April 2027 deadline.

That means:

No need to change your current process: Your finance teams will simply prepare the accounts, including an iXBRL tagged version as usual, and provide these to the Corporate Secretarial team for board approvals and submission them through Diligent Entities.

Governance stays robust: The Company Secretarial team retains control over approvals, compliance, and authentication.

Seamless change: Diligent Entities already supports submission of documents and forms to Companies House and now extends that capability to financial statements.

With Diligent Entities, you get:

Submitting accounts through Diligent Entities avoids fragmented governance responsibilities, with a single team managing board approvals, additional separate direct submissions (such as parental guarantee documentation), and LLP-specific rules.

Software-only filing Companies House iXBRL Diligent Entities

The only change your business needs to make is ensuring your financial statements are iXBRL-tagged. Once that’s done, Diligent Entities takes care of the rest — enabling a smooth, compliant submission to Companies House.

Take control of your filing process with Diligent Entities

Don’t let the transition to software-only filing impact your governance processes. Diligent Entities empowers your Company Secretarial team to stay in control, maintain compliance, and submit financial statements with confidence.

Get ahead of 2027 filings with a process built for your business — not against it. Explore Diligent Entities today and see how your team can stay in control.

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