Director identification (ID) number

Corporate Compliance and Corporate Admin will be retired on 15 April 2024.
You won't be able to use either software after 15 April 2024. Learn what this means for you

From November 2021, company directors in Australia will need to begin applying for a director identification (ID) number. This is a unique identifier given by the Australian Business Registry Services (ABRS). Learn more.

These new obligations for directors are part of the wider anti-phoenixing initiative implemented by the Australian Federal Government.

Requirements for director IDs

Who is responsible for maintaining director IDs?

You may be asked to help with maintaining this data on behalf of your clients or their associated entities. To better understand your obligations and responsibilities, seek legal advice.

What is required of ASIC agents?

There are no changes to ASIC lodgements. After a director is appointed, the director will need to apply for their own director ID. Learn more.

Who needs a director ID?

If you're a:

New company director (appointed after October 2021)—from 1 November 2021, you need to apply for a director ID within 28 days of when you're appointed, including new company registrations. From 5 April 2022, you need to have a director ID prior to your appointment.
Existing company director (appointed before November 2021)—you need to have a director ID by 1 November 2022.
CATSI company director—you have extended timeframes. Learn more.
ASIC agent—you don't need a director ID.

See the ABRS website to learn more.

Managing directors in your MYOB software

We've updated MYOB AE/AO and MYOB Practice so that you can record director IDs. The ID appears when you're appointing a director for a new company or looking in the director's client details.

To find directors in MYOB software

You can create a report to find the director associations. To learn how to run the report, see our help page.

To record director IDs in MYOB software

If you only use MYOB Practice, you can record the director ID:

Go to Contacts > Contact list and select a client by clicking anywhere in the client’s row to view their details on the same page.
Click Edit (
).
Scroll down to Director ID and enter the details
Click Save.

If you use MYOB AE/AO and MYOB Practice, you can record the ID in a new Extra field in MYOB AE/AO for director IDs, and it's shared to Corporate Admin. We released this update in version 5.4.41. To learn how to enter a director ID in AE/AO, check our help page.

To inform directors of the requirements in MYOB software

You can use task templates to communicate the requirements with directors.

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FAQs for director IDs

Where does the director ID appear in Corporate Admin?

When you're at step 2 (appointing a director) and step 5 (reviewing the form) of registering a company, you can see an existing contact's director ID number.

You can also see the director ID in a contact's client details.

Is my MYOB software still compliant?

All of our MYOB software is still compliant. In the future, there might be changes to ASIC registers as they're migrated to the ABRS. We're working with government to optimise these changes for industry. Learn more.

Can MYOB software download director IDs from ABRS's database?

Not yet. ABRS haven't built out this functionality, but plan to in the future.

How do directors apply for a director ID?

You can let directors know that ABRS have three ways to apply: