Register of public sector partners

What it means

The register of public sector partners covers anyone receiving state money, property or other benefits above the statutory limits: suppliers, grant recipients, tenants of state property.

Its purpose is to disclose ultimate beneficial owners, the real people behind the company. The company does not file it itself: an authorised person does and is responsible for it.

The register of public sector partners is often confused with recording the beneficial owner in the commercial register. Every company must do the latter itself, with no third-party verification; the partners register applies only to those receiving benefits from the state, and its weight lies precisely in verification by an authorised person who answers for the data.

How it works in practice

The authorised person is a lawyer, notary, bank, auditor or tax adviser. They verify the ownership chain and confirm or update the entry annually and on every change.

Without the entry no contract in public procurement can be signed and no payment received. Preparation takes days to weeks, so it happens before a bid, not after the award.

For clients bidding for EU funds or contracts from towns and municipalities, we watch whether the payments will cross the statutory limit and an entry will be needed. We then prepare the material for the authorised person: a current register extract, the ownership structure with stakes and the documents of parent companies, so the verification takes no longer than necessary.

What to watch out for

Naming the wrong beneficial owner exposes both the company and the authorised person to sanctions, including exclusion from procurement. Updating on an ownership change cannot wait.

The entry is also forgotten in subcontracting: if a company supplies part of a state partner’s contract that is paid from public money, the duty to register may extend to it as a subcontractor. That often surfaces only when the main contractor withholds payment because the public customer refused to pay its invoice.