Historic Data Retrieval

Bulk Data Requests
#1

As a developer using the Companies House API, I have noticed that while it is possible to retrieve information regarding a company’s current status, it is not possible to identify the date of any changes in the company’s previous status.
For instance, if a company is currently in liquidation, I am unable to determine the date it was proposed to be struck off or the date it began liquidation. I am wondering if there is any method or API available to retrieve this retrospective
information from the Companies House.

#2

Welcome! (I’m not Companies House - just another punter…)

I may be missing something here but you do get some information about this from the insolvency endpoint?

This returns:

  • a list of cases - so more than one if there were previous insolvencies for example, and

  • for each case a list of dates and type of action - so e.g. when the company was wound up. (The list can be found in the Companies House “enum constants” lists in the “constants” file - it’s the insolvency_case_date_type section.

In addition you can see these events (with dates of filings) using the Filing History endpoint, and helpfully filings are categorised and you can limit your search to a particular category - just pass the category parameter in with value insolvency.

Example (random company) using curl to retrieve information - I’ve snipped some information out to highlight this and formatted the output:

curl -u YOUR_API_KEY: "https://api.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/12744404/insolvency"
{
    "etag": "2d0e79e340dd5791fef12cb421bccf773088c6c9",
    "cases": [
        {
            "type": "members-voluntary-liquidation",
            "dates": [
                {
                    "type": "wound-up-on",
                    "date": "2020-12-30"
                },
                {
                    "type": "declaration-solvent-on",
                    "date": "2020-12-30"
                }
            ],
            ...
            "number": "1"
        }
    ],
    "status": []
}

Using the Filing History:

curl -u YOUR_API_KEY: "https://api.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/12744404/filing-history?category=insolvency"
{
    "filing_history_status": "filing-history-available",
    "total_count": 8,
    "items_per_page": 25,
    "items": [
        {
            "category": "insolvency",
            "date": "2023-04-24",
            "description": "liquidation-disclaimer-notice",
            "type": "NDISC",
            ...
        },
        {
            "category": "insolvency",
            "date": "2023-04-24",
            "description": "liquidation-disclaimer-notice",
            "type": "NDISC",
            ...
        },
        {
            "category": "insolvency",
            "date": "2023-04-20",
            "description": "liquidation-disclaimer-notice",
            "type": "NDISC",
            ...
        },
        {
            "category": "insolvency",
            "date": "2023-04-20",
            "description": "liquidation-disclaimer-notice",
            "type": "NDISC",
            ...
        },
        {
            "action_date": "2022-12-29",
            "category": "insolvency",
            "date": "2023-02-27",
            "description": "liquidation-voluntary-statement-of-receipts-and-payments-with-brought-down-date",
            "description_values": {
                "brought_down_date": "2022-12-29"
            },
            "subcategory": "voluntary",
            "type": "LIQ03",
            ...
        },
        {
            "action_date": "2021-12-29",
            "category": "insolvency",
            "date": "2022-02-18",
            "description": "liquidation-voluntary-statement-of-receipts-and-payments-with-brought-down-date",
            "description_values": {
                "brought_down_date": "2021-12-29"
            },
            "subcategory": "voluntary",
            "type": "LIQ03",
            ...
        },
        {
            "category": "insolvency",
            "date": "2021-01-07",
            "description": "liquidation-voluntary-appointment-of-liquidator",
            "subcategory": "voluntary",
            "type": "600",
            ...
        },
        {
            "category": "insolvency",
            "date": "2021-01-07",
            "description": "liquidation-voluntary-declaration-of-solvency",
            "subcategory": "voluntary",
            "type": "LIQ01",
            ...
        }
    ],
    "start_index": 0
}

Hope this helps.

#3

Ace response! Thank you very much this makes complete sense!