Direct Incorporation vs. Incfile/Bizee

If you’re looking to start a registered business, then you might be considering using a business formation service like Direct Incorporation or Bizee (formerly known as Incfile). These business formation companies (and other companies like them) can be very helpful if you feel overwhelmed by all the business paperwork you’re facing.

But in the Direct Incorporation vs. Bizee matchup, who comes out on top? Are there any alternatives you should consider instead? In this guide, we’ll review both Direct Incorporation and Bizee, comparing how these two options compete in terms of value, customer service, customer reviews, and more.

Let’s get started.

About Direct Incorporation and Bizee

Bizee and Direct Incorporation are two companies that can help you form and manage a business in the U.S. On the surface, the two brands might seem really similar, but each company has its own pros, cons, and company history.

Direct Incorporation is based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and they’ve been in business since 2003. According to their website, they’ve served over 80,000 clients in that time, helping with business formations, trademark registrations, and more.

Bizee is very close in age to Direct Incorporation; they were founded in 2004 under the name Incfile. Later, in 2023, they rebranded as Bizee to better match their (now) broader range of service offerings: while they originally only offered business formations, they now provide a variety of business services.

Key Facts About Bizee and Direct Incorporation

At first glance, Bizee and Direct Incorporation might seem really similar, but there are lots of distinctions to keep in mind. We’ll dive into the nitty-gritty details throughout this Bizee and Direct Incorporation review, but for now, let’s take a quick glance at these companies.

Direct Incorporation

• Offers website building tools and trademark services to build and protect a brand
• Poor customer support
• Lackluster customer reviews

Bizee

• Includes one year of free registered agent service if you use them to form your company
• Offers a free LLC formation package (plus state fees)
• Not accredited by the Better Business Bureau

Direct Incorporation vs. Bizee: Our Full Review

In our assessment of Direct Incorporation and Bizee, we evaluated each company on the basis of several different categories: business formation services, registered agent service, additional service offerings, customer feedback, and customer reviews.

Let’s take a closer look at those categories.

Business Formation Services

Bizee can help you form several types of business structures, including a limited liability company, a nonprofit, or a corporation. Direct Incorporation can help you form an LLC or corporation. But how much will it cost you? For most small business owners, that’s an important question to answer.

Both Bizee and Direct Incorporation offer a variety of business formation packages to choose from, each with different services bundled together. In this section, we’ll focus on the LLC formation service packages. To start, here are Bizee’s LLC packages:

• Basic ($0 plus state fees): Bizee checks if your name is available and then files your Articles of Organization with standard processing (3 weeks). You also get one year of free registered agent service, a month of free virtual address service, and a tax consultation.
• Standard ($199 plus state fees): You get the same services as the basic package, plus help creating an operating agreement, getting an employer identification number (EIN), and filing IRS Form 2553 if needed.
• Premium ($299 plus state fees): You get everything in the standard package as well as rush filing (2 days), business contract templates, a domain name, a business email address, and more.

And here are Direct Incorporation’s LLC package options:

• Standard ($174 plus state fees): Direct Incorporation completes the incorporation process for you; they’ll run a preliminary name check of your desired business name and file your formation documents on your behalf. You’ll also get an EIN (and S corporation election, if you need it), one free year of domain name registration, a month free of their business compliance program, and a free tax consultation. You also get access to their client resource center.
• Premier ($297 plus state fees): The premier package gets you everything in standard, plus corporate documents like an operating agreement, resolutions, and more. You also get a corporate record book and company seal.
• Elite ($429 plus state fees): You get everything in the premier package, plus four months of website hosting, one free email account, and a do-it-yourself website.
• Venture ($699 plus state fees): This is one of Direct Incorporation’s all-inclusive formation packages, as it includes everything in the elite package, plus more advanced branding services. You’ll get their trademark service, 3 months of their trademark monitoring service, a year of domain name registration and website hosting, five free email accounts, and a professional business website. This package also includes 12 months of their business compliance program.

Some of Direct Incorporation’s packages have pretty robust features, but they’re pretty pricey. And it’s pretty hard to argue with Bizee’s free LLC formation package (plus state fees). That’s why ZenBusiness offers the same perk: we’ll form your LLC for you at no additional cost; you just pay your state filing fees.

Registered Agent Service

If you’re forming a registered business like an LLC or corporation, then you need to designate a registered agent. A registered agent accepts service of process and other important state communications on behalf of a business.

Technically, you might be allowed to serve as your own registered agent, but only if you meet the criteria: you’re an individual resident of the state, you have a physical address there, and you’re present at that address during all normal business hours. For many small business owners, those criteria are too restrictive to be sustainable. That’s why many choose to hire a registered agent service like Bizee or Direct Incorporation.

Bizee’s registered agent service costs $119 per year, but you’ll get one year of free service if you use them to form your LLC. Meanwhile, Direct Incorporation charges $159 per year for registered agent service, and you’ll get six months for free if Direct Incorporation forms your company. You can also get that free six-month perk if you use the brand’s registered agent change service, which costs $149. At this time, it doesn’t appear that you can buy agent service as a standalone product; you’ll have to use the amendment service or hire Direct Incorporation to form your business to use them as your agent.

Additional Services

Both Bizee and Direct Incorporation offer a good number of other services beyond registered agents and incorporation service. While we won’t give an exhaustive list of all the services provided by each brand, we can give you a general idea of what to expect.

Bizee provides a good variety of different business tools, including applying for an employer identification number (sometimes called a federal tax ID number), electing S corporation status, writing an legal documents like an operating agreement, creating a banking resolution (which you might want when you’re getting a business bank account), trademark registrations, and more. They also offer an annual report service and a business license service, where they’ll research what licenses and permits your unique business needs. Bizee’s service library might be smaller than some competitors, but it’s still a fair variety.

Direct Incorporation has a fair number of services beyond business incorporation, too. They also offer some business management services, including foreign qualification services, amendments, corporate kits, dissolution assistance, help filing for 501(c)(3) status, and annual report filing. They even offer trademark registration and trademark protection services.

All told, either brand can help you manage your business well beyond the LLC formation process.

Customer Reviews

When we’re assessing a company, we like to look at third-party review sites like Trustpilot or the Better Business Bureau; we find that these are great sources to get an unbiased view at what customers are saying. So we took a look at some of the reviews for Direct Incorporation and Bizee.

Bizee has a pretty strong showing on Trustpilot, with a 4.6/5 star average across more than 22,000 reviews (at the time of this writing). Their positive reviews frequently mention that the platform is easy to use and quick. However, some of Bizee’s reviews mention that customers had issues getting problems corrected when an error was made on their filing; some even complained that their customer support representative was rude.

For what it’s worth, we should also mention that some users are concerned that Bizee isn’t accredited by the Better Business Bureau; in fact, their business profile receives an F rating from the BBB for unanswered complaints from customers. If you value BBB accreditation, you’ll want to look elsewhere.

Meanwhile, customer reviews are one of Direct Incorporation’s biggest weaknesses. To start, they don’t have tons of third-party reviews to begin with. When we last checked, they had zero reviews on Trustpilot, four reviews on their BBB profile, and only 24 reviews on Yelp. For a company that began in 2003, that’s a very small number of reviews.

But more importantly, the third-party reviews Direct Incorporation does have are quite negative (yes, the ones on their own website are pretty positive, but we don’t find those to be a realistic indication of a brand’s performance since they can pick and choose which ones they highlight). All of their BBB reviews are one-star, and their Yelp reviewers frequently complain about unhelpful customer support, slow service, and other issues.

Finally, Direct Incorporation isn’t BBB accredited. Like Bizee, their BBB profile gets an F rating for unresolved complaints.

If you prefer brands with a strong customer review history, you’ll want to stay far, far away from Direct Incorporation. If you value BBB accreditation, you’ll find both brands wanting. In contrast, ZenBusiness is BBB accredited, and we’ve got excellent customer reviews. As of this writing, we’ve got a 4.8/5 star average score across 24,381 reviews.

Customer Support

At some point in your business journey, you’ll probably run into questions. Maybe you’ll have questions about expanding your business or changing one of the online services you’re subscribed to. When that happens, you want to be certain that you’ll get good customer support from a helpful, polite representative. That’s why we’ve taken a look at the customer service channels offered by these brands.

Bizee offers support by phone, email, or the contact form on their website. We tested their support channels, and we got an answer within one business day when we reached out through their contact form. The only main drawback to their support is availability; they’re only available from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. CT on weekdays. No weekend support can be a little frustrating if your business is your weekend side hustle.

Bizee’s customer reviews usually mention a positive experience with customer service, too. In the few negative reviews Bizee does have, customers mention that their support rep was a little less helpful, especially when they were trying to cancel an unwanted service.

Customer support is another glaring weakness for Direct Incorporation. In fact, most of their negative reviews stem from poor customer service. Customers frequently complain that they couldn’t get in contact with anyone, and when they did, support was unhelpful.

We had an equally frustrating experience with their support, too (in fact, of the brands we’ve reviewed, Direct Incorporation has had one of the least helpful support departments). We’ve tried to reach out by phone and chat, and both experiences were poor. When we called for phone support, we were instructed to leave a message, and it took hours for someone to give us a return phone call. When we asked a question through chat, we waited over 40 minutes for an agent to connect. No one did. Technically, their listed support hours run from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. ET on weekdays, but in our experience, reaching out during those hours doesn’t guarantee a prompt response.

Which LLC formation service is best?

Both Direct Incorporation and Bizee have their unique selling points. Bizee has a competitive free LLC package (plus state fees) bundled with a free year of registered agent service. Direct Incorporation offers a variety of business solutions for building and protecting a brand (especially in the Venture package). But odds are, you might be hesitant about Direct Incorporation’s poor reviews, or maybe you’d prefer a BBB accredited brand.

If you’re looking for alternatives, check out ZenBusiness. We’re proud to offer our customers the best value and exceptional customer service. Like Bizee, we’ll form your LLC for free (plus state filing fees). But we can also provide you with registered agent service at a great value ($99 for your first year and $199/year afterwards). We’ve also got a worry-free compliance service to help you stay in good standing. Plus, we’re BBB accredited, and our customer feedback is fantastic: out of 24,381 Trustpilot reviews, we’ve got a 4.8/5 average score. We pride ourselves on providing excellent customer service whenever you need it.

We can help!

Here at ZenBusiness, we pride ourselves on providing reliable services for a variety of small business needs at a great value. Whether you need registered agent service for a good price, help starting your LLC, a Money Pro app for managing your business finances, or something else, we’ve got your back. We’ll help handle the red tape for you so you can focus on what you love: running your business.