Guide · registering a SACCO

How registering a SACCO works.

This is the route as we have seen it, step by step, with what went wrong along the way. It comes from a society we work with. As at 28 October 2026 it has lodged an application, has taken the Registrar's comments, and is preparing to lodge again. It is not registered yet, and this guide will say so until it is.

This is a practical guide, not legal advice. The Co-operative Societies Act and the Registrar's own directions decide. Read the Act and speak to your provincial co-operatives office early.

The route, in order

1 · Start from the Act

Build to the Act from day one

Our society began with a constitution written for an investment group. Its books were sound, but its bodies were not the ones the Act prescribes. Start from the Act and a model set of by-laws, then add your own rules.

2 · Choose the name

Short, with "co-operative" and "Limited"

The first name was too long. The Registrar's comment was a short name containing "co-operative" and ending "Limited". Settle the registered name before anything is printed. The brand can stay as a tagline.

3 · Have the right bodies

A Management Committee and a Supervisory Committee

Members passed a resolution to set up a Management Committee, a Supervisory Committee answerable to the members, and committees for loans, risk and investment, education and technical advice. The Registrar reads the by-laws for the Act's shape, so get the bodies right first.

4 · Write the by-laws

Your contract with the Registrar

Write the by-laws first. Your constitution and rules must follow them, never contradict them. Three signed copies go with the application.

5 · Collect every particular

At the moment of joining

The application needs each member's particulars: names, sex, education, national I.D. Our society had admitted eleven members without collecting all of them. Collect everything when a person joins, not when you lodge.

6 · Lodge and talk

Lodge by hand, ask to meet the reader

Lodge at the provincial office, pay the fee, and ask to meet the officer who will read the pack. Informal comments cost days. A formal refusal costs months.

What goes in the pack

The application form

Completed and signed, with the registered name you have settled on.

Feasibility study and work programme

What the society will do, for whom, and how it will pay its way.

Member list and shareholding list

Every founding member with their particulars, and what each has subscribed and paid for in share capital.

By-laws, three signed copies

Adopted by the members.

Minutes

Of the preliminary meeting, of the adoption of the by-laws, and of any resolution that created the committees, with the vote attached.

The fee

Ask the provincial office for the current amount.

Five lessons we would give any group

The Act is the specificationBuild the society to it from day one and registration is paperwork, not a rebuild.
One vocabulary"Share" meant two things in our documents. Decide early what the Act's share is for your society, and use the same words everywhere. The Ministry wants share capital, not savings.
One consistent setEvery document the Registrar might see must tell the same story. A full review found many inconsistencies, nine of them in the by-laws.
One registerProduce the application pack, the leadership schedule and the shareholding list from a single register. By hand they took weeks and disagreed.
Why botherRegistration gives the society a bank account, an auditor who can sign, and the standing to lend lawfully.

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