Restoration is Irish company law’s resurrection machinery: a struck-off company brought back to the register and treated as if it had never left. The routes are real and regularly run — but each is a process with requirements, and each punishes delay. Here is the map.
Mary Molloy Solicitors are solicitors, not accountants or tax advisers. Nothing on this page is tax, accounting or financial advice — engage your accountant on those questions, and both advisers together where matters straddle the line. Company law procedures, CRO practice and filing deadlines change frequently, and reform of the law governing owners’ management companies and charities is ongoing; confirm the current position before acting on anything here.
Route One: Administrative, Within 12 Months
The CRO can restore a company on application within 12 months of dissolution: filings brought current, requirements met, no court. It is the route of choice whenever the calendar allows, and the reason the correct response to discovering a strike-off is speed — the window closes on the anniversary whether or not you were ready. What dissolution meant in the meantime is covered in what happens next.
Route Two: Court, Up to 20 Years
Past 12 months, restoration goes to court — available for up to 20 years from dissolution, with notice parties, proofs and conditions, and the powerful result that the restored company is treated as having continued in existence throughout. Heavier and costlier than the administrative route, entirely runnable, and the standard path for the company whose dissolution surfaced years later — usually when property, a claim or a legacy issue forced the discovery. Where the company held property, the State-vesting dimension is handled within the process.
Route Three: The OMC Exception
Owners’ management companies get the MUD Act’s dispensation: the administrative CRO route stays open to them for 6 years — the Oireachtas’s acknowledgment of how routinely volunteer-run OMCs were struck off for missed filings, and how catastrophic dissolution is for a development’s title and insurance. If your apartment block’s company is dissolved, the odds are good the easier route still exists: the OMC restoration file.
Run It Properly
Every restoration follows the same discipline: establish the facts (dissolution date, ground, what the company holds and owes, what happened in the gap); choose the route the calendar allows; assemble the compliance — the outstanding returns and accounts are usually the real work; and fix the cause, because a restored company that resumes not filing is buying this article twice. The prevention version — registered office, secretary, RBO and returns all current under the 2024 Act’s widened strike-off net — is at the changes explained, and the practice overview at strike-off & restoration.
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About the Author
Richard O’Shea, Solicitor practises with Mary Molloy Solicitors (established 1981), advising company directors, shareholders, family businesses, owners’ management companies, clubs and charities across Ireland. Richard holds a Diploma in Mediation from the Law Society of Ireland — central to this work, where shareholder, family-company and apartment-block disputes are relationship disputes first, and where the MUD Act itself empowers the Circuit Court to direct parties to mediation. Contact Richard on 01 5827148 or richardoshea@marymolloysolicitors.com.
This article is for general information only and does not constitute legal advice. Every farm and family situation is different, and you should obtain advice on your own circumstances before acting. In contentious business, a solicitor may not calculate fees or other charges as a percentage or proportion of any award or settlement.