Czech Republic: Commercial Register entries may newly also be effected by notaries public
In theory, entries into the Commercial Register could be made by a notary public since 1 January 2014 already, when the Public Register Act came into force. However, actually proceeding in this way has only become feasible as of 15 May 2015, because various technical and legal obstacles had first to be overcome. The relevant court fees for Commercial Register entries made by notaries have since been added to the Act on Court Fees, notaries public now have the necessary remote access rights to the Commercial Register, and the software that is used for the purpose appears to suffer from no major glitches.
For a notary public to be able to make the desired entry into the Commercial Register, he or she must first have drawn up what is known as the “underlying”, or reference, deed. Notaries are not authorized to make entries in the Commercial Register unless they executed such reference deed. Note, however, that this deed will as a rule be mandatory anyway, even if the entry were to be effected by the competent register court – e.g. in the case of the foundation of a new company, or in the case of an amendment to a company’s memorandum of association. The reference deed and the related entry into the Commercial Register must be performed by one and the same notary public, i.e., the reference deed is for all intents and purposes non-transferrable. If the notary public needs to be presented with additional documentation for the entry into the Commercial Register after the reference deed has already been executed, then the notary public must draw up a so-called “certification deed”. The notary will then lodge the relevant documents with the roll of deeds and submit other relevant material to the competent register court as needed.
Cost savings can be achieved especially when founding a new company. The court fee for first entry of a joint-stock company is CZK 8,000 (as compared to CZK 12,000), and that for first entry of a limited liability company is CZK 2,700 (as compared to CZK 6,000). An entry of changes to the existing record triggers a court fee of CZK 1,000 instead of CZK 2,000. However, to this one must add the notary’s fee of CZK 300 (not including VAT) for the entry into the Commercial Register, and usually also the fee for a certification deed (CZK 1,000 without VAT).
Source: Act No. 304/2013 Coll., on public registers of legal entities and natural persons