ASIC organisation type, class and sub-class codes

Every organisation on the ASIC register carries a four-letter type code that says what kind of entity it is: APTY for an Australian proprietary company, APUB for an Australian public company, FNOS for a foreign company, MISM for a managed investment scheme, BUSN for a business name and so on. Companies also carry a class code describing the members' liability (limited by shares, limited by guarantee, no liability, unlimited) and a sub-class code that distinguishes, for example, a listed public company from an unlisted one or a superannuation trustee proprietary company from an ordinary one. Together the three codes tell you what a company is and which ASIC products are available for it.

Where it appears in the API

• company.type, company.class and company.subClass from GET /v1/companies/{id}.
• company.type inside the company summary embedded in companyMatch results from GET /v1/companies/search, in person roles, weekly summary items and charge records.
• types[] query parameter on the company search endpoint, which accepts any code from the organisation types table.
• company.governanceType on public companies (the governance types table).
• nameReservation.intendedType and nameReservation.intendedClass on a name reservation.
• subType on new-registrations weekly summary items includes CHGT (change of company type), which is the event that changes these codes.

Organisation types

Organisation classes

The class describes the liability of members. LMSH (limited by shares) is by far the most common. LMGT is used by not-for-profit public companies. NLIA is restricted to mining companies. PROP, MORT and EQUT in this table describe managed investment schemes and trusts, not companies. NONE and UNKN appear on foreign companies and converted state records.

Organisation sub-classes

Codes beginning with EX or NEX (exempt and non-exempt proprietary) come from the Corporations Law before July 1998 and appear on historical records; modern proprietary companies are PROP, or PNPC, PSTC and HUNT for the special cases. LIST versus ULST is the quickest way to tell a listed public company from an unlisted one. RACA and RACO are used for registered Australian bodies. The FFSP, NCCT, OABR and PTSH sub-classes belong to non-registered entities (NRET) that exist in ASIC's database because of the Australian Business Register.

Common combinations

Which types support which products

Not every organisation type has a full ASIC record behind it. The table below shows which types each product accepts. Purchasing an unsupported combination returns extract_unavailable_for_type (HTTP 422), and requesting a document list for a type without one returns document_list_unavailable. See purchasing for how extracts are bought and read.

Organisation types with document lists

A document list can be requested for these types only. Business names, associations, co-operatives and name reservations do not have document lists in ASIC's database.

Governance types

Public companies record whether they are governed by a constitution or by the replaceable rules in the Corporations Act 2001. The value is null for proprietary companies and other types.

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