The government, through the Companies Office of Jamaica, has been working to improve business registration in Jamaica. This is one of the critical measures being employed to raise the country’s ease of doing business ranking in the World Bank’s Doing Business Report. As of January 2, 2014 therefore, individuals incorporating a company or registering a business name, will no longer be required to make separate visits to NHT, NIS or TRN offices to register their businesses.
The new registration process will be as follows:
- New business owners will visit the Companies Office of Jamaica (COJ) and fill out a superform which requests all the information needed to register their companies with all relevant statutory organizations.
- Upon registration with the COJ, the new business’ data will be routed to TAJ and NIS via an electronic portal, to create an NIS number and TRN
- This information will then be submitted electronically to the NHT and an account created for the customer. All this would be done without the business owner having to visit the NHT for any kind of interface.
- Upon receipt of the account number from our Information Systems Department, the Compliance Department will then make contact with the customer and carry out the necessary follow ups.
Doing business in Jamaica is becoming easier. For the before and after scenario please see the attached “Business Registration before and after”.
Statistics indicate that the countries which have the best rankings for doing business undertook initiatives, such as creating one-stop shops, abolishing or reducing minimum capital requirements, simplifying registration formalities, cutting or simplifying post-registration procedures and introducing online procedures.
Click here to view the Companies Office of Jamaica (COJ) website