Renew Your Hong Kong Business Registration Certificate 2026

Your Hong Kong Company's Business Registration Certificate, the BRC, renews with the Inland Revenue Department when the certificate period ends, not on your incorporation anniversary. From the 1st of April 2026, a one year certificate costs HK$2,350, a three year certificate HK$6,170. The Renewal Demand Note arrives around the middle of the month before your new period starts. You pay it, and the receipted note becomes your new certificate. That's the whole mechanism. In this video, one year versus three year, and who should pick which, what happens when you're overseas, and what happens if it lapses, because annual compliance has four separate clocks, and today we're following exactly one.

Three quick distinctions, because this certificate gets confused with everything. It is not your Certificate of Incorporation. That's your birth certificate, issued once, never renewed. It is not the NAR1. The annual return goes to the company's registry on your incorporation anniversary, and it has its own video. The BRC belongs to the Inland Revenue Department, and its clock is the certificate's own expiry. And one line for our BRN video. The business registration number is the number printed on this certificate. Today is about renewing the certificate itself. Different registers, different clocks. Our annual compliance video draws the whole map. Today is one road on it.

The numbers from the 1st of April, 2026, with the levy back in the price. One year, HK$2,350. That's a HK$2,200 registration fee, plus the HK$150 Protection of Wages levy. Three years, HK$6,170. HK$5,720, plus a HK$450 levy. Notice the levy is the same per year either way. The discount lives entirely in the registration fee. Hold those two numbers. The choice between them is the end of this video. Renewal runs on the Department's initiative. The Business Registration Office posts a renewal demand note approximately in the middle of the month before the month your new certificate period starts. New period starting in May? Expect the note around mid-April. There's no application form.

You pay the note, and the receipted demand note, with its machine-printed payment line, is the renewed certificate. Keep it, and display the valid certificate at your principal place of business. Now the overseas founder reality. That note is posted to your registered office. If you're in Berlin, and your registered office is a pile of unopened mail, the renewal system fails silently, which is exactly why that address needs someone reading it, as our registered address video explains. Two failure modes. First, the note never comes. That does not cancel the duty.

If you haven't received a demand note, notify the commissioner in writing within one month of the certificate's expiry, and renew anyway, in person, by post, or online, where the note can also be retrieved electronically. Second, you let it lapse. Carrying on business without a valid certificate is an offense, and before any prosecution, the practical damage arrives first. Banks doing periodic reviews, marketplaces re-verifying your seller account, and later filings all want a current BRC. An expired certificate quietly breaks things that took months to set up. So which do you choose? First the mechanics, then the honest arithmetic.

The election is made in writing to the business registration office at least one month before your current certificate expires. Form IRBR184 to switch to three-year. Form IRBR199 to revoke it later. Same one-month timing. Once made, it sticks until revoked, and it covers the main business and every branch. And the rule that decides marginal cases? No refund. Cease business mid-certificate, and the unused time is simply gone. The arithmetic. Three one-year certificates cost $7,050. One three-year certificate costs $6,170. The saving is $880 Hong Kong dollars, if you stay the course.

So, pick three-year if this company will still exist in three years and you want one less department letter to chase. Pick one-year if you might close, sell, or make the company dormant, because the department will not refund unused time. Fewer demand notes is the real benefit. $880 is the bonus. This is convenience, not a tax strategy. Three plain notes. One, the three-year certificate is not a discount play. Over three years, the saving is under $1,000 Hong Kong dollars. Buy it for the fewer letters, not the price. Two, whichever term you choose, the law requires a valid certificate at all times.

Renew every year is only true on a one-year certificate, but always be current is true for everyone. Three, this whole system assumes your registered office mail gets opened. The demand note is the only reminder the department sends. The facts in 20 seconds. The business registration certificate renews with the Inland Revenue Department on the certificate's own clock. It's not the NAR1 and not your Certificate of Incorporation. From April 2026, one year, $2,350. Three years, $6,170. Saving $880 if you stay three years. Refund never. Demand note, mid-month before the new period. Pay it and the receded note is the certificate. No note?

Notify the department within one month of expiry and renew anyway. At Captime Corporate Management Limited, a licensed TCSP, license number TC010212, we handle this type of matter from start to finish. As your company secretary and registered address, we receive the demand note, scan it to you, pay it on your instruction, and file the certificate where your bank will one day ask for it. hk or use the link in the description. No credit card, no obligation. Thank you for watching. If this helped, give it a like and subscribe to Accurate, Hype-Free Guides to Running a Hong Kong Company. See you in the next video.