Companies not been returned on the API

1

Hi, We have noticed issues lately that some companies are not being returned, here is a few sample.

• House of Batteries
• Crane Electronics Group
• Harrods
• Maxima

These companies are appearing on the companies house website and are returned on the beta API.

Is there any reason why they are not returned on the SOAP API?

2

I presume by SOAP, you mean the XML Gateway Eddie?

I will advise relevant technical colleagues.

Thanks
Simon N.

3

Yes that’s correct Simon, we are using the XML Gateway

4

I’ve been having a similar problem that only affects one company, all our other clients return properly. I get the following error in the response XML, which seems very generic.

X+Wc4066-26909 Companies House are unable to complete this request (Information on this Company is not currently available.) / 9212

5

Eddie / Oliver,

In the XML schema there is an element LIVE whereas the beta site does no such filtering (it will do eventually).

The algorithms used for XML and BETA are therefore completely different (also the Beta site only holds companies up to 6 years dissolved).

In essence they will return different results.

I hope this clarifies.

SDN

6

Hi Simon, not sure I follow - as far as I can tell, the company (reg no 09038688) is active and should theoretically be live on the XML gateway? Are you saying there is a property that is set to determine whether the company is returned by an XML request, and this company is set to not return?

7

Apologies Oliver,

Your issue is indeed different to the one raised by Eddie.

I have an idea why you are getting this issue in this particular instance - I will check and respond back to you as soon as possible.

SDN

8

Great, thanks Simon, I appreciate your help.

9

Hi Oliver,

As I suspected, due to system maintenance related to the records of this particular company, no information is currently unavailable for it via our XML Gateway “legacy” platform.

The API, which is based on a different platform, should still (as you have discovered) return some information however.

Please accept our apologies for any inconvenience caused.

SDN

10

Hi Simon, OK, thanks for the confirmation of the issue, will consider whether we’ll go the REST API route.

11

Hello. Apologies for hijacking this thread but I have a few queries re. the issues outlined above.

I’ve been asked to look into some legacy code a contractor had previous written for us using SOAP / XML.

In regards to the underlying data, does this come from the same source? So for example, if I look at company 01509577 in http://wck2.companieshouse.gov.uk//compdetails and FOCAL PLASTICS LIMITED overview - Find and update company information - GOV.UK, do these come from the same data source i.e. the old CH website and beta website both draw the data from the same source. Effectively, does the XML service just get the same data but in a different shape/format?

Would there be any advantages of moving towards the beta REST api and if so, what would these be?

Further to this, is the XML service going to be supported going forward?

12

Many apologies for the delay in responding Richard,

In a nutshell, yes all the services feed off of the same database although it can take some time (on occasions) for all output mediums to update with new / fresh data.

Also, the newer API is cloud based, whilst the legacy ones are not.

The main advantage of the API is that its a recent product using a platfom we are standardising on and one that will continue to be updated with new features, and of course is completely free of charge.

The XML gateway, being a legacy service, will be closed in due course but there is no timescale for this yet - at this time, it has a more comprehensive name checker facility than the API does.

I hope this clarifies.

SDN

13

Thanks for getting back to me and apologies for not replying sooner myself! I was off on half term holidays with my kids :smile:

Thank you very much for the information, it is greatly appreciated. We mostly use the the XML for the name checking service to compare to our CRM system so given it is a bit more advanced at this moment in time, I think we’ll stick with it but also look to our advise management that this won’t always be here so we should schedule in some development time for implementing the API as a back up.

Is there any notification/email I can register with to receive alerts as to when this service will be closing?

14

Hello SDN

I’ve actually got a LIVE example which is confusing me somewhat and resulted in the original source query.

We have a company with a Company Number of 03033654. If I fire off our XML I get nothing returned, similarly when I go to http://wck2.companieshouse.gov.uk// I get the “Information on this Company is not currently available”

However, when I go to CENTRICA PLC overview - Find and update company information - GOV.UK , the data is present.

Why does one site report details yet the other does not?

15

Hello again Richard,

There is a reason for this - from time to time (and for various reasons) we are required to undergo maintenance on certain document records held on the public register.

How this effects our output systems differs however - for XML we have to temporarily deny access to all information, for the API, only certain data is withheld.

I hope this clarifies.

SDN

16

Hello SDN

Thank you for clearly that up, it gives me something to go back to the business with. Whilst I haven’t gone over to the API yet, I have put in a bit of quick screen scraping code in to mitigate these instances for when the XML returns a null.

Thank you again for your guidance, it is most appreciated.

Rich

17

Happy to help Richard!

SDN