Construction data guide
Construction forms and dissolves companies faster than almost any sector, which makes the register both the best cheap due diligence you can run and the most misleading thing to count.
Construction has more companies coming and going than any other major sector on the register. That is not instability so much as structure: projects get their own vehicles, and most of the trades operate through a limited company of one or two people.
Both facts change what the data is good for.
What the register holds
The standard record for every company: name, number, status, incorporation date, registered office and postcode, officers with appointment dates, people with significant control, and the filing history.
Construction spans three SIC divisions, and the split matters more here than the total:
- 41 construction of buildings, including 41100 development of building projects and 41201 and 41202 for commercial and domestic build
- 42 civil engineering, roads, utilities, infrastructure
- 43 specialised construction, which is the trades: 43210 electrical, 43220 plumbing and heating, 43390 completion and finishing
A 41100 developer and a 43220 plumbing contractor are both "construction" and share almost no commercial characteristics. Counting them together produces a number that means nothing.
The cheapest due diligence there is
If you are about to hand work to a subcontractor, the register answers three questions in about ten seconds each. How long has this company existed. Is it actually active, or in liquidation. Who are the officers, and what else have they run.
That last one is the useful one. A director whose previous three companies were dissolved inside two years is a pattern you can see for free, and most people never look.
Nothing here replaces proper checks. It is just the cheapest first filter available, and in a sector with this much churn it filters a lot.
What the register does not hold
- Accreditations. CHAS, Gas Safe, NICEIC, SafeContractor, none of it. Those live with the scheme operators.
- Projects. No sites, no contracts, no pipeline. Planning applications are a separate dataset from local authorities.
- Turnover or size. Most construction companies file small company accounts, so the numbers are absent.
- Trade specialism beyond the SIC code, which is self-declared and often generic.
The registered office is also very often the accountant, not the yard.
What people in the sector actually do with it
- Screen a subcontractor before engaging them, on age, status and officer history
- Build a list of every contractor in a set of postcodes, including the ones with no web presence
- Watch new formations under 41100, which often signal a new scheme
- Track dissolutions, which in this sector cluster and say something about conditions
- Find connected companies through shared officers and shared registered addresses
Where to start
The construction sector view breaks divisions 41, 42 and 43 down by individual SIC code, with formations and dissolutions.
If the cut you need is not there, tell us what it is.
See the data for construction
The register broken down by sector, and the datasets that apply to it.