Joy OkoroInc Authority is one of the best and affordable places to form an LLC (Limited Liability Company) for your new company.
After discovering this company, I found it to be the only affordable place to start your company formation and it takes a few minutes.
Inc Authority has been in existence since 1989 and has formed over 110,000 LLC and Corporations, it also has over 2000 positive reviews by happy customers.
In this post, we will be doing an Inc Authority Review and know how well they perform in 2021.
Whether you need an LLC to set up your Stripe account, show proof you have a business in the US, or for other things, you’re at the right place.
We will also discuss the Inc Authority features, pricing, and alternatives so you can make your choice and be proud of it.
They waive their service charges, labor costs, and overhead.
You only pay the mandatory secretary of state fees, which you’ll need to pay regardless of who forms your LLC for you.
The state fees differ considering the state you’re forming your LLC in and you should be careful where the state you form your LLC, or you may end up paying ridiculous annual filing fees.
What is Annual Filing Fee?
I figured out that some of us may not be updated as regards to United States Laws when it comes to forming a company and some certain law words you should know.
Filing fee is fee charged by a government organization to accept a document for processing, and this is paid yearly.
This fee keeps your company going whether you made sales or not.
The moment you stopped or don’t pay them, their will be numerous reminders, they may decide to add additional late fee to the initial filing fee price, but when it shows you how no interest in paying, your company will be taken back and it will cease to exist.
California charges an $800 annual filing fee, and a super high State fees and Delaware charges a $500 annual filing fees, and a high State fees.
Just to mention a few.
You pay these annual fees yearly and the time you stop paying them, your LLC will seize to exist.
However, we will be recommending a State you’ll form your LLC with a $15 annual filing fee and little state fees.
In the end, you’ll only be spending $178 to form your LLC including getting an Employer Identification Number (EIN).
Meanwhile, on other LLC formation companies, they charge various service fees and other extra fees to form your LLC, that’s why you may end up paying over $700+ to form an LLC.
You may be wondering why Inc Authority offers this service 100% free, well it’s because they want to gain your trust and to help those with little budget form their LLC.
While using Inc Authority LLC, the fees are super cheap, you only get to pay for State fees, Operating agreement, and EIN. You can pay for other ad-dons if you actually need them.
The Employer Identification Number (EIN) or Federal Tax Identification Number, is used to identify a business entity.
It’s also a Social Security Number (SSN) for the company.
Always form your LLC in a state called Kentucky or any other state that has cheap formation prices and affordable filing fees.
You can always form your LLC in any state, considering you’re ready to pay whatever that comes your way.
Inc Authority Review & What they do
Don’t have any idea what exactly Inc Authority is all about? Don’t panic – we got you covered.
By the end of this highly wide-ranging article, you will feel like a greatly informed person with a detailed overview of what Inc Authority can do for the smooth running of your business from scratch.
Authority is a Legal Service Company that provides assistance to customers or clients to build different business entities.
They do that with the help of document filing services. Yes, you heard it right – ‘Document filing services’. That is what you are going to get when you think through buying an LLC formation service from IncAuthority Reviews.
Overall Steps and Requirements to Open an LLC in the United States
1. Select a State: Before you form an LLC in the United States, you have to select a specific where you want to form your LLC in.
Each state has different fees which the state government charges to accept your formation.
We always advise our readers to form their LLC in Kentucky, since the state fee is only $40.
States like Alaska charges over $250 to form an LLC in their state.
2. Name Your LLC: While forming your LLC, you need to come up with a name for your business. For example, I would use TheProfany LLC for my business name.
3. Registered Agent Services: You will also need a registered agent residing in the state of your formation.
You will get a personal US address in the specific state you formed your LLC if you formed your LLC using Inc Authority.
These agent helps forward and scan every physical mail you receive to your electronic mailbox.
They serve as a middle party in your business in terms of conveying the physical mails sent to you in the united states to your electronic mailbox.
Fortunately, Inc Authority gives its customers a free 1-year registered agent service, the following year, you start paying $99.
But it’s OPTIONAL if you won’t be really making use of it. You can also buy a cheaper US Physical Address for forwarding online if you make some searches.
4. EIN (Employer Identification Number): If you’re a non us citizen, an EIN is considered as your SSN. This is required to prove your identity in the united states especially if you will be forming an LLC, opening a US bank account, or doing some signups online that require an EIN. In fact, it’s necessary.
Inc Authority package comes with an EIN for $49. It’s affordable, since other LLC formation companies charges from $119 to file an EIN on your behalf.
5. Operating Agreement: This document officially proves you as the owner of the LLC that was just created. Should in case in the future, you’re required to prove you own the LLC, you will be required to provide an operating agreement.
Even if you ignore it for now, if it’s required in the future, you will still need to file for an operating agreement for your US Company.
6. US Bank Account: Personally, I will advise you to open a Payoneer account. Since it has little requirements, and you can easily get your US Banking details.
The interesting part of forming an LLC using Inc Authority is, you don’t need to do these yourself, you just to fill a questionnaire form and submit and that’s all.
Always select the features or packages you really want and do away with the irrelevant ones.
Inc Authority Pricing
Like I previously said, Inc Authority is one of the cheapest places to form a legal LLC for your new company.
The service is completely 100% free and you only pay necessary state fees depending on the state you choose.
There are also add-ons you will meet while forming your LLC, and you can decide to add them or skip them.
The most important ones are:
- Choose Kentucky as State (for affordable state fee)
- EIN
- Operating Agreement
You’ll only be spending only $178 if you selected the most important things such as State (Kentucky), EIN, Operating Agreement, etc, you will only be spending less than $200 to start your LLC.
And that’s really amazing knowing the fact, you’ll have to spend up to $500 to set up an LLC on other sites.
You’re lucky.
Inc Authority Features
They do have good features if you form your LLC over there and few of them are:
1. Free Name Search
Inc Authority will check your business name against multiple databases.
2. Preparation & Filing
Inc Authority will prepare your entity formation documents and submit them to the state.
3. Registered Agent
Ensure you never miss a legal notice. Inc Authority will be your registered agent for 1 year.
4. Digital Storage & Delivery
A digital copy delivered to you and the storage of your essential start-up documents.
5. Business Checking Account
Inc Authority will provide access to a business checking account with exclusive incentives.
6. S-Corp Election Form
Inc Authority prepares and files S-Corp document Form 2553 with the IRS.
7. INC CARE Support
Our expert support staff will help answer any questions you have, via email or phone.
8. Tax Planning Consultation
Your new business will receive a Tax Planning Consultation to help you save more of your business income.
9. Business Funding Analysis
A Funding Expert will review your financing needs and share with you startup funding solutions.
Inc Authority Alternatives
A very good Inc Authority Alternatives is Incfile and with $189, you can form an LLC at Incfile while choosing your state like Kentucky.
They are my best places (IncFile and Inc Authority) to set up a limited liability company because it’s affordable and gives me everything I need.
Meanwhile, the best state we always recommend to our readers to form an LLC in Kentucky because the annual tax fees are super cheap as well as the state fees.
Always form your LLC in Kentucky!
How to Form an LLC at Inc Authority
If you’ve decided to start your LLC and most especially with just $178, then you can go ahead and form your LLC as soon as you can before it’s too late.
At Inc Authority, you’re going to form your LLC and get your EIN/TAX ID. Follow the simple guidelines below to complete the signup. It’s easy and takes just a few minutes. All you have to do is choose your state, enter your business name, and form your LLC!
Step 1: Go to IncAuthority.com
When you arrive at IncAuthority.com, click on the “start now for free” tab.
Step 2: Select Entity Type and Filling State.
In your entity type, select Limited Liability Company (LLC) and in the Formation State, select Kentucky.
Click on Save & Continue.
Step 3: Enter Your Personal Details
In this step, enter your First and last name, email, and contact phone number.
You’ll need a US Phone number, download DingTone from play store and buy a US Phone Number for $4.99.
DON’T use the one in the photo below.
Click on save and continue.
Step 4: Enter Your Business Details
Enter your business name and business description (if you have a clothing online store, say you have an online and you sell clothing and apparel).
A brief description of your company, a sentence or two describing your business.
Select your business benefit and click save & continue.
Step 5: Business Address
You need a US Address to continue in this step, go to Shipito.com and signup.
You’ll get a US address instantly, use it, and continue your signup. Takes just 1 minute.
In your US Address, note that CA means California.
Step 6: EIN/Federal TAX ID
The interesting part about Inc Authority is they get an EIN for you at $49, which is considered as the cheapest place to get one. Others charge from $95 and above.
You need to include the EIN/Federal Tax ID which is very important!
Click save and continue.
Step 7: Operating Agreement
An operating agreement is important because it provides proof you own the business.
In case any problem occurs in the future, you can be able to correct them with your operating agreement and in case of Stripe requires it.
Select the operating agreement and proceed with the form.
Step 8: Addons
The next pages contain Addons and they include the following:
- INC Protection Advisor. $27/month.
- LawSuit Protection. – $99.
- Express Delivery – $49.
- Domain Name – $29.95
- Business License Package – $99
All these ad-dons are not important, so you can skip all of them until you get to the payment stage.
Step 9: Make Final Payments
In the end, you’ll only be paying for State Filing Fee, EIN, and Operating Agreement.
Other formation companies charge a lot for offering this service but IncAuthority Charges $0 Service fee.
Now you need to make payment using either Debit/Credit Card or PayPal.
For the Delivery Option, you can select $0 free delivery (Electronic Delivery) and they will be delivered to your email.
Finally, that is all. You’ve successfully created your LLC in the United States.
Inc Authority Phone Number
Getting in touch with Inc Authority shouldn’t be hard, you can mail them or call them on +1 877-684-2836 and they will be happy to attend to your questions or concerns.
Hi Joy , thanks for all you do for us. i checked and found out that these states Delaware and whoming tax is like 0% and kentucky is not among the tax free state in the U.S…. please why then do you suggest kentucky when there are some tax free states?
Hello Jenny, there was a mistake on the post, but it has been updated.
What I meant was “Annual Filing Fee” and not “Annual Tax Fee”.
You can now lookup each state’s annual filing on Google for clarification on the fees.
Because of that, I choose Kentucky, since it has just $15 annual filing fee, and it’s the cheapest when compared to other states like Delaware.
Delaware has $500 annual filing fee.
Filing fee is fee charged by a government organization to accept a document for processing, and this is paid yearly.
Thank you Joy, this is noted.
(1) what of the tax like when somebody purchases goods from your online store, the tax he pays, do you think Kentucky tax rate is low because i think that is the one that affects bottom line most.
(2) The EIN somebody said one can easily call the IRS organization and do it himself from Nigeria instead of paying $49 to inc authority
please advise
1. There are no taxes actually when someone purchases from your online store.
Although you can customise a tax for buyers to see in checkout but it’s optional, that’s if you don’t want to collect tax.
2. After getting your LLC (excluding EIN) from incauthority, you can call IRS and get your EIN if it works out.
Don’t fill the online form, they always request for ITIN for non us citizens, which you might not have.
You just have to call.
The $49 is just to help you escape the processes if you don’t want to do it yourself.
Joy, will the IRS not going to ask for the ITIN?
No
Hello Joy!
I paid all fees you suggested we pay on your post, IncAuthority formed my LLC but sent me documents requesting me to fill and revert, and on those documents is a space for my SSN which I don’t have. According to your post, it wasn’t suggested that we would be filling extra documents including g SSN. please how do I solve this?
In the SSN field, enter “FOREIGN”.
Hello Joy,
Thank you so much for the article, it’s really interesting and helpful.
I’m from Tunisia, and I’m really looking forward to gothrough these steps to get my stripe account up and running. and be able to us it in my new project worldwide. I already have a payoneer account that I’ve been using for almost three years now.
but I’m still a bit skeptical about it.
like won’t Stripe detect that my company is made throught incauthority, and the US bank is actually from payoneer ? which will later close my stripe account ?
are incauthority really legit and not a scam ? because even though we saw a lot of good reviews on them in trustpilot, still there are some poor reviews of frustrated people saying that they are scam.
Lastly, please state if you dealt with them personally and how happy you are with their services.
Thank you very much.
Hi, stripe doesn’t have any problem with that. It’s a legitimate act.
Stripe itself can form a company for you if you want to use their stripe atlas services.
Stripe requirements also includes forming a company in a country you want to setup your stripe account, so it’s a normal occurance.
Incauthority isn’t scam, it’s a formation company just like the others if you do some search online, the differences are the affordable fees.
No business is perfect, people will also complain, even Google Chrome on PlayStore, people also leave bad reviews.
Yes, I have formed few companies with them and it was delivered successfully with no problems.
Currently, you may experience delay in your EIN from the IRS because of the Covid-19.
Incauthority offers a 1year free Registered agent service and second year starts with either $99/year.
You can change your registered agent service provider to a cheaper one from the second year if you wish or become your own registered agent.
It’s wise to contact and find out any other information you want from them before going ahead.
Finally, the services I advised on the post are the important ones you need in other to form a company (which comes under $200 as a budget).
Let me know if you have further questions.
Thank you very much for your answer it’s really helpful, also there’re a bit of questions and issues around Payoneer US Bank account to be used with stripe, as some people have said that since Stripe demands Debit Card, it have blocked their account for because the account provided by payoneer wasn’t a debit one.
Also, there’s a bit of skepticism around that, since payoneer’s account is under your personal name not the company’s name. so it also cause an issue.
What do you think about that? will Payoneer really cause an issue if use with Stripe ?
The only time stripe demands for credit/debit card is to confirm your identity.
To confirm if the name you entered is really your name.
Your LLC/EIN confirms your business
/Company name not the debit/credit card.
Thank you so much for the reply!
Hello Joy
please i have paid all fees and the LLC is out ,it remains for me to review and sign the documents forwarded to me but i realized i made a mistake in the mailing address and contact address
1) can i change the mailing address to Nigeria
2) do you think they will allow me make the correction on the contact address? i have written them but yet to get any response from them
Kindly advise
Thank you for this article. I followed the steps carefully. In the form sent for EIN, I was asked to enter county and state. what county should I add?
Depending on the address that’s on your EIN form, you have to google the county.
Assuming the address you have , the state is California, you have to google “California counties” then choose any one and write it, then followed by the state.
Example: the address on my ein form is California, I will write.
Orange County, California.
Hi Joy,
Thank you for your help. I formed a business with IncAuthority last year but now, I’m confused about taxes. Are we supposed to file annual returns or pay taxes to the IRS? If yes, how do we go about it? I live in Nigeria by the way!
Hello Joy, you are amazing. Your write up is so interesting and understandable. Can I call you please? I would really appreciate it.