Telling the NRS when your company's details change
What a Nigerian company does when its address, contacts or controllers change: the 30-day rule, the NRS portal, CAC and its own documents.
By Achekam · · 5 min read · For Running a business businesses in Nigeria
A company moves offices, changes its phone number, or takes on a new shareholder who now controls it. The business carries on as before, but the records the tax authority and the Corporate Affairs Commission hold about it are now wrong. Letters go to the old address. Notices land in an inbox nobody reads. A clearance certificate request stalls because the details on file do not match.
Nigerian law treats this as more than housekeeping. There is a time limit for telling the tax authority, a separate duty to tell CAC about people with significant control, and a practical need to make sure your own invoices, payslips and letters carry the new details from the same day. This guide takes each in turn.
The 30-day rule in the Tax Administration Act
Registration is the starting point. Under section 4 of the Nigeria Tax Administration Act, 2025, every taxable person must register with the relevant tax authority and obtain a Taxpayer Identification number, the Tax ID. Section 9(1) of the same Act then requires a change in particulars to be notified within 30 days.
Two points follow. The clock runs from the change itself, not from the next time someone logs in or files a return, so a move in the middle of a month can fall due before your next VAT return does. And the duty sits with the taxpayer: nobody else will correct the record for you.
These references come from the gazetted copy of the Act hosted by the Lagos State Internal Revenue Service. Two official texts of the 2025 tax Acts exist and some figures differ between them, so check the section against the text your adviser relies on.
The registration duty reaches beyond your own company. The same Act makes a statutory body or company that awards a contract to an unregistered person liable to an administrative penalty of N5,000,000. Customers who know this will ask for your Tax ID and expect the details behind it to be current.
Updating your profile on the NRS self-service portal
The NRS says its Self-Service Portal lets taxpayers update their profile and contact details and track the status of their filings and payments. The same portal, at selfservice.nrs.gov.ng, is where taxpayers register, file and pay taxes, and download tax clearance certificates and receipts. The NRS launched it as Rev360 on 30 April 2026 to replace TaxPro Max, moving existing profiles across; what Rev360 changed for taxpayers covers the switch.
Before logging in, read the NRS's own Self-Service Portal page, which lists what the portal lets a taxpayer do, including the profile update.
When you make the change, keep proof: a download or screenshot of the updated profile, the date, and the name of the person who made it. If the NRS later writes to the old address, that record shows when you told it.
What CAC must hear about separately
The NRS is not the only register. Under section 119 of the Companies and Allied Matters Act, 2020, a person who becomes a person with significant control over a company must notify the company in writing within seven days, and the company must notify the Corporate Affairs Commission not later than one month after receiving the information or any change in it.
CAMA defines a person with significant control to include anyone who directly or indirectly holds at least 5% of the shares or voting rights, or who has the right to appoint or remove a majority of the directors. The notice form is CAC-PSC 01 in the Companies Regulations 2021, and the same information must appear in every annual return. The Commission may fine a defaulter for every day the default continues.
So a share sale can start two clocks at once: one month to tell CAC after the company hears of the change, and 30 days to correct any tax particulars it affects. Other changes, such as new directors or a new registered office, have their own CAC filings, and your company secretary should confirm which forms apply.
Quoting the Tax ID on every letter about the change
The NRS says a Tax ID must be quoted accurately on all tax forms, payments and correspondence with tax authorities, and that a valid Tax ID makes a person eligible for services such as tax clearance certificates.
Apply that to the change itself. Any letter or e-mail to the NRS about new details should carry the Tax ID exactly as issued, beside the company's registered name. Do not put an old number in its place. If the change is queried months later, the Tax ID is what ties your letter to your file. For where the number belongs on sales documents, see showing your Tax ID on invoices.
Making your own documents follow in Achekam
Updating the NRS and CAC fixes their records. It does nothing to your own paperwork, and that is where an old address tends to linger longest.
In Achekam, the logo, brand colour and company details set under Settings appear on payslips, tax certificates and documents composed for signature. Change the address or phone number there once, and documents produced afterwards carry the new details. The VAT registration number is entered in Settings under Firm Profile: documents made by the server print it, and they are titled Tax Invoice only when a VAT number is set.
Keep the two updates separate in your mind. Changing Settings in Achekam changes your documents, not the NRS's records. Achekam does not file Nigerian tax returns either: a person with the business's NRS filing permission files on Rev360 and uploads the receipt. The portal update is yours to make.
A change-of-details checklist
- Write down what changed and the date it took effect.
- Update the profile and contact details on the NRS self-service portal within 30 days, and save evidence of the update.
- Where the change touches control of the company, collect the written notice from the person concerned and file the CAC notice within one month of receiving it.
- File any other CAC forms the change needs, for example for directors or the registered office.
- Quote the Tax ID on every letter or e-mail about the change.
- Update the company details and, where relevant, the VAT number in Achekam's Settings.
- Tell your bank and your main customers, so payments and withholding certificates carry the right name and address.
Most changes of details are quick to make and slow to notice when they are missed. Put the 30-day date in the diary on the day the change happens, and do the portal update, the CAC filing and the Settings change together rather than waiting for a letter to come back undelivered.
General guidance only, not advice on your own circumstances. Tax and payroll rules change: check the current position with the authority or your adviser.
