UK administrative and support service companies in numbers (October 2026)
Key figures compared with the UK
| Measure | This sector | All UK | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Active companies | 349,258 | 5,166,057 | 6.8% of UK |
| Median company age (years) | 7.2 | 5.6 | 29% higher |
| Incorporated in the last 3 years | 29.7% | 34.0% | 4.3 pts lower |
| Filing micro-entity accounts | 33.8% | 32.4% | close to UK |
| Filing dormant accounts | 10.4% | 10.8% | close to UK |
| Accounts overdue | 2.2% | 1.8% | 0.4 pts higher |
| Under a proposal to strike off | 9.1% | 7.4% | 1.7 pts higher |
| In liquidation, administration or receivership | 2.3% | 2.0% | 0.3 pts higher |
| With outstanding charges (secured lending) | 9.5% | 12.1% | 2.6 pts lower |
| Median net assets | £3,598 | £3,113 | 16% higher |
| Negative net assets | 18.6% | 18.8% | close to UK |
| Net current liabilities | 34.0% | 36.2% | close to UK |
| Median cash at bank | £13k | £10k | 24% higher |
| Cash covers creditors due within a year | 35.7% | 35.3% | close to UK |
| Holding £100k or more in cash | 22.6% | 20.3% | 2.3 pts higher |
| Median employees (where stated) | 1 | 1 | close to UK |
Balance sheet measures use each active company's most recent machine-readable (iXBRL) accounts with a period ending in 2024 or later: 258,765 companies here (74.1% of active). Net assets 25th to 75th percentile: £1 to £49k. Cash 25th to 75th percentile: £792 to £82k.
What the numbers say
On the balance sheet, administrative and support services look very like the UK as a whole: 18.6% report negative net assets against 18.8%, and the median current ratio is 1.24 against 1.19. The differences are in age, register behaviour and borrowing.
- Age: a median of 7.2 years against 5.6. Much of this comes from division 82 office administration and business support, where the median age is 9.8 years. The largest code, 82990 other business support n.e.c. (180,504 live companies), is a broad catch-all that many long-established service and holding-type companies likely chose years ago.
- Strike-off and late filing: 9.1% under a strike-off proposal and 2.2% overdue, against 7.4% and 1.8%. Cleaning, landscaping and security firms are often small, labour-based and short-lived, and division 81 (cleaning and landscaping) has a median age of only 3.6 years.
- Fewer charges: 9.5% against 12.1%. Most of these businesses own vans and equipment rather than property, so there is less to secure lending on. Employment agencies are the exception at 14.9%, partly because invoice finance against client debts is common in staffing.
The negative net assets trend has tracked the UK closely: 17.6% for financial years ending in 2014 and 18.4% in 2025, against 16.4% and 18.6% for the UK. A negative figure is a warning sign, not proof of insolvency; our guide to negative net assets explains how to read it.
Because outsourced cleaning, security and staffing suppliers often carry payroll risk, it pays to check a supplier before paying and to look at overdue accounts as an early signal. For comparison, see professional, scientific and technical companies.
Share with negative net assets, 2014 to 2025
Share of accounts with net liabilities (total liabilities larger than total assets) by financial year end, for companies on the live register. Dissolved companies are not included because the register no longer lists their industry, so earlier years show survivors. Negative net assets is a warning sign, not proof of insolvency: see what negative net assets means.
Accounts types filed
| Type of last accounts | Share here | Share UK |
|---|---|---|
| Micro-entity | 33.8% | 32.4% |
| Total exemption full | 27.4% | 23.8% |
| No accounts filed yet | 20.1% | 26.0% |
| Dormant | 10.4% | 10.8% |
| Unaudited abridged | 3.1% | 2.9% |
| Full (audited) | 1.9% | 1.5% |
| Small | 1.7% | 1.2% |
| Audit exemption subsidiary | 0.9% | 0.7% |
The type shows how much a company has to disclose. Micro-entity and abridged accounts contain no profit and loss account on the public record. Read more about accounts categories and micro-entities.
Active companies by year of incorporation
Companies incorporated in each year that are still active today. Younger cohorts are larger partly because older ones have been dissolved.
Most common activity codes
| SIC | Activity | Live companies |
|---|---|---|
| 82990 | Other business support service activities n.e.c. | 180,504 |
| 78109 | Other activities of employment placement agencies | 27,445 |
| 81210 | General cleaning of buildings | 19,826 |
| 81300 | Landscape service activities | 18,577 |
| 78200 | Temporary employment agency activities | 14,083 |
| 80100 | Private security activities | 13,317 |
| 79110 | Travel agency activities | 12,917 |
| 81299 | Other cleaning services | 11,123 |
Divisions in this section
| Division | Active companies | Negative net assets | Median cash | Overdue |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 82 Office administration and other business support | 180,424 | 18.6% | £14k | 2.5% |
| 81 Services to buildings and landscape activities | 64,294 | 17.4% | £6,976 | 1.4% |
| 78 Employment activities | 45,023 | 18.2% | £17k | 2.4% |
| 77 Rental and leasing activities | 21,658 | 20.2% | £13k | 2.0% |
| 79 Travel agency and tour operator activities | 19,404 | 23.5% | £17k | 1.7% |
| 80 Security and investigation activities | 18,455 | 16.3% | £10k | 1.9% |
Methodology
Industry is the first SIC code each company declares on the Companies House register (snapshot 1 October 2026); the dormant placeholder 99999 is excluded. Status, accounts type and due dates come from the register. Financial measures come from our parse of 37 million iXBRL accounts filed since 2008; values above £100bn are treated as extraction errors. Companies filing paper or PDF accounts are not in the balance sheet figures. Full details: methodology.
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