Find out about the role of directors.
Societies use different words like ‘director’, ‘trustee’, ‘committee member’ to describe the role of people serving on the main governing board/committee of a society.
The rules of individual societies must set out the powers of the board of directors. You can find the rules for a society on the Mutuals Public Register[1]. The rules of a society will also set out the process for appointing and removing directors.
Duties of directors
We detail the duties of directors from paragraph 8.1.5[2] of our guidance.
Some community benefit societies are charities. Charity regulators provide further information for directors (trustees) of charities:
- Charity Commission for England and Wales[3]
- Charity Commission for Northern Ireland[4]
- Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator[5]
Notification of appointment and removal of directors
Societies are not required to notify us of the appointment or removal of directors. So we do not maintain a list of society directors.
Societies submit an annual return and accounts to us each year. The annual return provides details of directors of that society and can be found on the Mutuals Public Register[1].
We provide an information note setting out the position on society directors[6].
Minimum age
The minimum age to become a director is set out in legislation. A person under the age of 16 cannot be a society director.
Director disqualification
The Company Directors Disqualification Act 1986 applies to societies. You can learn more about director disqualification from the Insolvency Service[7].
You can also search the register of disqualified directors[8].