How to Change Your Business Address on CAC (2026)

The timing rule for an address change at CAC turns on one structural question, and answering it first decides the rest of the procedure.

Does the new registered office address sit in the same Local Government Area as the old one, or does the move cross an LGA boundary?

Section 50 of the Companies and Allied Matters Act 2020 governs the registered office of a Nigerian company and the procedure for changing it. The Act distinguishes two classes of address change.

An intra-LGA change — the new address sits in the same Local Government Area as the old one — is treated as a routine administrative update. The company passes a board resolution, completes Form CAC 3 (the notice of change of registered office address), uploads the proof-of-new-address document, and files at post.cac.gov.ng. The change clears on the CAC register within a working week on a clean submission.

An inter-LGA change — the new address crosses an LGA boundary, for instance from Ikeja to Surulere or from Wuse to Garki — carries the additional procedural weight of the Section 50 fourteen-day special notice obligation. The company is required to give fourteen days of advance notice of the change to the Commission before the new address takes effect on the register. The notice is filed in the same Form CAC 3 envelope with a covering letter and the supporting documents; the change activates after the fourteen-day window runs.

The LGA-boundary test is not optional. A company that moves across an LGA boundary and files a routine intra-LGA-style notice without the fourteen-day procedure will be queried at CAC. The query asks for the missing special-notice element and pauses the filing until the fourteen days have run. The cleaner route is to identify the LGA boundary at the start of the move and structure the filing accordingly.

The article walks the intra-LGA path first because it is the more common case, then covers the inter-LGA Section 50 procedure, then the post-change operational updates that sit downstream of the CAC filing.

For a move that stays within the same Local Government Area the procedure is light and the timeline is short.

1. 1
   Confirm annual returns are current
2. 2
   Pass a board resolution authorising the address change
3. 3
   Complete Form CAC 3 (notice of change of registered office address)
4. 4
   Gather the proof-of-new-address document
5. 5
   Submit at post.cac.gov.ng with the documentary upload
6. 6
   Pay the modification fee through Remita
7. 7
   Track to completion

The seven steps run end-to-end in under a working week for a clean intra-LGA filing. The company can continue trading from either the old or the new address during the processing window; the operational move is independent of the CAC register update.

A change that crosses an LGA boundary adds the Section 50 special-notice element to the documentary chain. The mechanics at the portal are the same; the difference is the fourteen-day notice that runs before the new address activates on the register.

Why the notice matters. The registered office is the company's official contact-point with the rest of the world — with the Commission, with creditors, with the courts, with any party serving legal process. An inter-LGA move shifts that contact-point materially; the fourteen-day notice gives the Commission and any interested party advance warning of where the company's official documents will be received from a future date. The notice runs even where the company has already physically vacated the old premises.

The procedural shape:

• The board resolution and Form CAC 3 carry an explicit statement of the inter-LGA character of the change. The resolution states the old LGA, the new LGA, and the effective date.
• A covering letter to the Registrar-General, dated and signed, gives fourteen days of advance notice of the change. The letter states the existing registered office, the new registered office, the date from which the new address takes effect, and a request that the register be updated accordingly.
• The proof-of-address document is the same as the intra-LGA filing — utility bill or tenancy agreement covering the new premises.
• The submission goes through post.cac.gov.ng in the same flow as the intra-LGA filing; the portal accepts the inter-LGA filing through the same Change of Registered Office Address service with the covering-letter upload as an additional document.
• The fourteen-day window runs from the date the Commission acknowledges receipt of the notice. The new address activates on the CAC register after the window closes; the company's official correspondence redirects accordingly.

The total timeline for a clean inter-LGA filing runs 3 to 4 weeks — the fourteen days of statutory notice plus the standard 3 to 7 working days of CAC processing.

Cross-state moves. Where the new address is in a different state from the old, the inter-LGA procedure applies (every state-to-state move crosses an LGA boundary). The same Section 50 fourteen-day notice runs; no separate state-level procedure is required at CAC. The state-level tax authority where the company will operate (the new state's IRS) is a separate downstream update — see the post-change operational updates section below.

The address change is one of the most routine post-incorporation operations and sits firmly in the DIY-capable category at post.cac.gov.ng. A company director with an iCRP account can complete the filing in a single sitting; the documents are straightforward and the portal walks the user through every step.

The accredited-agent route is available and earns its fee in two narrower cases: where the company is a group of related entities moving offices together (the agent coordinates multiple filings as a single workstream), and where the move is part of a wider restructuring (a parent company relocating its head office in the context of a board change or a share-capital change that bundles multiple amendments). For a standalone address change the agent's service fee sits on top of the CAC statutory line without adding much beyond convenience.

Accredited agents charge between ₦15,000 and ₦40,000 in service fees for a routine address change, layered on top of the CAC line. The agent's invoice itemises the statutory CAC fee and the agent's professional fee separately so the company sees the breakdown.

Informal "CAC consultants" who hold no accreditation under the Section 332 framework can help with form-filling but cannot submit under accreditation privileges; the iCRP account creation step at https://post.cac.gov.ng/ is open to every registrant and the DIY route is the cleanest path for this operation.

The CAC certificate is the public document, but the address-change job is not complete when the CAC register updates. Several downstream records carry the registered office address and need separate updates.

Banking. The corporate bank account record carries the company's registered office address as part of the customer information bundle. The bank requires the updated CAC public-search printout (or the certified true copy of the updated particulars) plus a customer information update form. Most Nigerian banks expedite this for existing customers in good standing; the update is operational rather than re-onboarding. A KYC refresh on the corporate account is the bank's opportunity to confirm the new address against the underlying tenancy or utility documentation.

The Nigeria Revenue Service. The Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS, renamed the Nigeria Revenue Service under the Nigeria Revenue Service (Establishment) Act 2025 effective 1 January 2026, with most current sources using both names during the transition) holds the company's tax-side records keyed to the CAC registration number and the TIN. The NRS-side address-update is typically automated where the CAC and NRS integrations carry the change through; the company should confirm via the NRS Taxpayer Self Service portal at https://selfservice.nrs.gov.ng/ that the address has propagated. Where the propagation has not happened, a manual update at the local NRS office (using the CAC public-search printout as proof) clears the discrepancy.

State Internal Revenue Service. PAYE, business premises levy, and other state-level tax registrations are state-by-state. A cross-LGA move within the same state typically does not require deregistration from one tax office and re-registration at another (the state IRS holds a single state-level record); a cross-state move usually does — the company deregisters at the old state IRS and registers at the new state IRS, with the CAC public-search printout as the supporting document.

Suppliers, customers, tender desks. Supplier and customer contracts often carry the registered office as the formal notice-service address. A circular letter to active counterparties (or a contract addendum where the address is bound into the contract terms) updates the operational records. Tender desks where the company is on a vendor register typically require an updated CAC certificate or public-search printout to refresh their records.

Sector regulators. Where the company is regulated by a sector authority — SCUML for incorporated trustees, NAFDAC for food, drug, and cosmetic manufacturers, CBN for any financial-services activity, NCC for any telecoms activity — the regulator's records carry the registered office address independently of CAC. Each regulator has its own update procedure and timeline; the CAC public-search printout is the foundational document each regulator accepts as proof.

The downstream updates can run in parallel once the CAC filing clears. The cleanest sequence is CAC first (so every other counterparty sees the change reflected on the authoritative public register), then the downstream updates within the following two to four weeks.

• Do NOT physically move offices and operate from the new premises for months without filing the address change at CAC. The registered office on the CAC register is the legal address for service of process and statutory notices; operating from one address while the register shows another creates a legal-service-of-process problem if a dispute escalates. File within a reasonable window of the move.
• Do NOT assume an intra-LGA filing covers a cross-LGA move. The Section 50 fourteen-day special notice is a CAMA 2020 statutory requirement, not an optional courtesy. A filing that omits the notice element for an inter-LGA change will be queried at CAC and the filing pauses until the missing element is supplied.
• Do NOT submit the address change while annual returns are outstanding. The post.cac.gov.ng portal blocks every modification under CAMA 2020 Section 421 (companies) and Section 822 (business names) until the backlog clears. The block is structural — the company must file the outstanding returns first, with the late-filing penalty, then submit the address change.
• Do NOT use a personal utility bill in a director's name as proof of the new business address. The portal expects a utility bill in the company's registered name, or a tenancy agreement naming the company as tenant. A director's personal bill is not normally accepted; the alternative is a tenancy agreement covering the new premises with the landlord's signature.
• Do NOT skip the bank notification. A CAC-registered address change that does not propagate to the corporate bank account triggers KYC mismatches; a higher-value transaction may be flagged at the bank's compliance review. The bank update is a simple customer information change but it has to be initiated by the company.
• Do NOT use a P. O. Box as the registered office address. CAMA 2020 requires the registered office to be a physical address that is physically verifiable; a P. O. Box is not a registered office for CAMA purposes. The portal rejects P. O. Box addresses at the address-validation step.
• Do NOT expect the certificate of incorporation to re-issue with the new address. The certificate records the original incorporation event; the current registered address is held in the CAC register and returned by the public search. Where a counterparty asks for a document showing the current address, the route is a certified true copy of the updated company particulars (₦5,000 under the CAC New Schedule of Fees gazetted 29 May 2025), not a re-issued certificate.