What is the trust registration service?
Answered 17 March 2026
HMRC Guidance / Practice
The Trust Registration Service (TRS) is a register of the beneficial ownership of trusts, and provides a single online point of access for trustees and their agents to register and update trust records. It replaced form 41G(Trust), which was decommissioned on 30 April 2017.
Purpose
The TRS serves two main functions:
- Tax compliance: It provides a single online route for trusts to comply with their tax obligations.
- Anti-money laundering (AML): It implements the requirements of the Money Laundering, Terrorist Financing and Transfer of Funds (Information on the Payer) Regulations 2017 (MLR 2017), to ensure the UK has an AML and counter terrorist financing regime that is up to date, effective and proportionate, and to improve transparency about the ownership of assets held in trusts.
Scope
- From 2017: Trustees were required to register on TRS if the trust was liable to pay any of the following taxes: income tax, capital gains tax, inheritance tax, Stamp Duty Land Tax (Land and Buildings Transaction Tax in Scotland), or Stamp Duty Reserve Tax.
- From 6 October 2020: New rules extended the scope of the trust register to UK and some non-UK trusts, with some specific exclusions, regardless of whether or not the trust is liable to pay any tax.
Access to Information
Information held on the register about the beneficial owners of a trust may be provided to organisations and persons involved in preventative work in the field of anti-money laundering, counter terrorist financing and associated offences, but only on request and in certain limited circumstances.
Estates
Although estates are not themselves subject to registration under the Money Laundering Regulations, some estates must also register on TRS if the personal representatives need to complete a Self-Assessment Trust & Estate tax return, because TRS is the mechanism for estates to acquire a Unique Taxpayer Reference (UTR).
Further detail on trustees' obligations is available in the Trust Registration Service Manual at TRSM10000.
Citation sources
The Trusts Registration Service (TRS) provides a single point of access for trustees and their agents to register and update trust records online, replacing form 41G(Trust), which was decommissioned on 30 April 2017. The service provides a single online route for trusts to comply with their tax obligations as well as implement the requirements of the Money Laundering, Terrorist Financing and Transfer of Funds (Information on the Payer) Regulations 2017. At first set up in 2017, trustees were req
The Trust Registration Service (TRS) is a register of the beneficial ownership of trusts. As first set up in 2017, trustees were required to register on TRS if the trust was liable to pay any of the following taxes: income tax, capital gains tax, inheritance tax, Stamp Duty Land Tax (Land and Buildings Transaction Tax in Scotland) or Stamp Duty Reserve Tax. This information was accessible to HMRC and other law enforcement agencies but not to third parties. New rules introduced on 6 October 2020