Inside the building was the latest technology for communicating with cotton trading elsewhere in the world, including telephones, and cables linking directly with New York, Bremen and Bombay.

Up to 100,000 people a year used to visit the offices to register births, deaths and marriages before the facility was moved to St George's Hall.

[9][10] The building is in seven storeys, and the modern front on Old Hall Street, facing southwest, has 21 bays.

There are two levels of basements which originally contained the building's coal bunkers, restaurant and ballrooms.

[11] The façade on Edmund Street, facing northwest, has retained cast iron panels decorated with wreaths, made by Macfarlane's of Glasgow.