Address Change – Update Your Alberta Corporation's Registered Office

Registered office in Alberta: what the rules require

• Location: every Alberta corporation must have a registered office at a physical address in Alberta. A P.O. box alone is not enough.
• What it is for: Corporate Registry mails the annual return reminder to the registered office one month before your anniversary month, and sends its notices there when a return is missed. Legal documents are served there and on the agent for service.
• Agent for service: an individual located in Alberta with an Alberta address, mandatory for every Alberta corporation since the 2021 amendments to the Business Corporations Act. When the agent's address changes, that change is filed on its own notice.
• Records address: if the corporation's records are kept at a different Alberta address, that address is filed as well.
• When to file: promptly after the move.
• What it does not update: CRA holds your business number and program accounts (GST/HST, payroll, import/export) separately from Corporate Registry. Your bank, WCB-Alberta, insurers, landlords and customers also need the new address from you directly.

Why a stale registered office address is how corporations get struck

The reminder for your Alberta annual return goes to the registered office. If that address is an old apartment or a former accountant's office, the reminder never reaches you, the return goes unfiled, and the notices that follow go to the same dead address.

Keep missing the return and Corporate Registry strikes the corporation from the register, which dissolves it. Owners usually find out when the bank freezes the account or a lawyer runs a search. A struck corporation can be revived within 10 years, but the revival costs more than a change of address filed the week you moved. Check what the register currently shows with our free corporate lookup.

Who this is for

• The owner who has moved home or office and knows the corporation's registry record still shows the old address.
• The owner who used their accountant's or lawyer's office as the registered office and has changed firms.
• The owner whose agent for service (the individual in Alberta who accepts legal documents for the corporation) has moved or stepped down.
• The accountant, bookkeeper or law clerk moving a whole client list to a new office address, who needs one account, one order per corporation and partner pricing.

How it works

1. You fill in the short online form — about five minutes. Returning customers see the current addresses and edit only what changed.
2. A CORES-trained agent reviews the notice within one business hour: the address is in Alberta and physical, the agent for service is an individual with an Alberta address, and the corporation's name matches the registry record.
3. We submit the notice through a licensed Alberta registry agent into CORES. ACS is a private company; we are not a government office or a registry agent.
4. You receive the confirmation and the filed notice by email the same business day for orders received before 3:00 pm MT, with the checklist of who else to tell.

If a notice cannot be filed, our refund policy explains what happens.

Common mistakes we catch before filing

• A P.O. box listed as the registered office. It is not a physical address and the filing is rejected.
• Moving the office but not the agent for service. When the agent was the owner at the old address, the corporation is left with an agent nobody can find.
• An address outside Alberta, often when the owner has moved to BC or Saskatchewan and keeps the Alberta corporation. The registered office and the agent must stay in Alberta.
• Assuming CRA gets the new address. It does not; the registry and CRA are separate, and CRA mail sent to the old address is still deemed delivered.
• The annual return used as the change form. The return confirms the address on record; a change is its own filing.

What you need before you start

• The corporation's exact legal name, or its Alberta corporate access number.
• The new registered office address: a physical address in Alberta, with a street or land description, not a P.O. box alone.
• The new records address, if your records are kept somewhere other than the registered office.
• If the agent for service is changing: the agent's full name and Alberta address. The agent must be an individual located in Alberta; they do not need to be a lawyer. We can act as your agent through our agent for service service.
• The effective date of the move.
• A credit card. You do not need a registry login, because business owners cannot file in CORES, Alberta's Corporate Registry System, themselves; filings go through a licensed registry agent.

• A Notice of Change of Address covering the registered office and, where it applies, the records address, prepared by a CORES-trained agent and checked against the corporation's current registry record.
• A change of agent for service in the same order when the agent has moved or is being replaced.
• Filing with Alberta Corporate Registry (the government office that keeps the record of every Alberta corporation) the same business day for orders received before 3:00 pm MT.
• Confirmation of filing and the filed notice in PDF by email, ready for your minute book (the corporation's record book).
• The government fee, paid on your behalf and included in the price.
• A short checklist of who else needs the new address, because the registry filing does not update anyone but Corporate Registry.