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Read the Incorporate.com LLC service review below or choose ZenBusiness today.
Starts at $0 + state fees and only takes 5-10 minutes
Incorporate.com opened in 1899, and they’ve served 750,000+ clients since then. Over the years, their name has changed several times ― from Corporation Service Company to The Company Corporation to Incorporate.com ― but the core business has stayed the same.
The mission statement on the Incorporate.com website states that “It’s a cruel world out there for the small business owner. And we can relate because we’re entrepreneurs, just like you. We work with business owners throughout their companies’ life cycles, helping them overcome the obstacles blocking effective compliance. And we provide the kind of thought leadership and guidance that will inspire and encourage their continued success, no matter the odds.”
A fun fact about Incorporate.com is that they guarantee their services with a unique feature: their $75,000 Corporate Compliance Guarantee. With this guarantee, your purchase is protected against filing defects caused by negligence on the part of Incorporate.com. If your filing is found to be invalid through their fault, they will resolve the issue or pay you up to $75,000.
✔ Seeing as they originally opened in the 19th century (as The Company Corporation), Incorporate.com has impressive longevity. They’ve also formed over 750,000 businesses.
✔ Incorporate.com’s Corporate Compliance Guarantee covers their formation services against any filing defects for the life of your business. If your filing is found to be invalid due to errors made by Incorporate.com, they’ll resolve the issue or pay you up to $75,000.
✔ They have a collection of guides in their online Learning Center. Covering topics ranging from state-specific formation requirements to tax filings and deductions, there’s a wealth of information available.
✖ You can get cheaper LLC services from some of their competitors. Incorporate.com’s basic formation package costs $99 and has fewer features than other top LLC services that will form an LLC for free (just pay your state’s fee), like us at ZenBusiness.
Incorporate.com has three different packages for LLC formation: The Starter, The Essentials, and The Works. Here’s a breakdown of what you get in each package.
NOTE: Not all of the features they list on their package selection screen come with the advertised formation plans. In fact, you can’t purchase “The Essentials” or “The Works” packages without adding registered agent service (for $235/year), and even though annual report service is listed in these plans, that too will cost you an additional $150/year.
With this in mind, the prices on this page are the total amounts you’ll need to pay in order to receive all advertised features.
➢ Preparation and Filing of Articles of Organization: These documents officially form your LLC with the state. Incorporate.com will create these forms for you, then file them with your state of formation.
➢ Name Availability Check: They will search your state’s official business database to determine if your desired LLC name is available or if it’s already been claimed by someone else.
➢ Online Access to Company Documents: You’ll receive access to their online portal, where you can safely store and access your LLC formation documents.
Everything from The Starter package, plus…
➢ Federal Tax ID Number (EIN): An employer identification number (EIN) is basically a Social Security number for your business, and it allows you to pay business taxes, hire employees, open business bank accounts, and more. Incorporate.com will obtain your EIN from the IRS.
➢ LLC Kit and Seal: A binder with your company name printed on it, along with a customized decorative seal and some sample documents. Keep in mind that this isn’t required to have a compliant LLC and is an optional feature.
➢ Registered Agent Service: Incorporate.com will serve as your registered agent, receiving service of process and other important document deliveries on your behalf and forwarding them to your business. This service costs $235 per year and is mandatory if you want to purchase The Essentials or The Works packages.
➢ Annual Report Service: They will prepare and file your annual reports, making sure you remain compliant with your state government. This service costs $150 per year, and this cost isn’t included in their advertised prices.
Everything from The Essentials package, plus…
➢ Business License Research Package: With this service, Incorporate.com will identify which licenses, permits, and tax registrations your LLC requires to operate in a compliant fashion. They will provide you with the applications necessary to obtain these items and also give you instructions on how to fill them out and file them.
➢ Operating Agreement: This is the document that describes your company’s ownership structure, and it’s also where you can lay out how you want your LLC to be operated. Incorporate.com will draft this important document for you.
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**SPECIAL OFFER – Starter is $0 plus state fees with one optional free year of Worry-Free Compliance (renews at $199/yr).† ZenBusiness is a financial technology company and is not a bank. Banking services provided by Thread Bank, Member FDIC.
Overall, their prices are more expensive than many competitors’ offerings, without enough added value to balance out the increased cost. Furthermore, their $235 price point for registered agent service as an add-on is quite high. Besides the fact that the packages are all more expensive than those with other incorporation services, their package setup is misleading.
Two of their advertised features ― their compliance dashboard and annual report service ― are listed on the package selection screen as included features but are not actually included unless you also purchase their registered agent service as an add-on. Furthermore, the annual report service costs an extra $150/year on top of the $235/year registered agent fee, so it’s not really an “included” feature at all, even if you do buy registered agent service.
Incorporate.com has plenty of experience, as they’ve been around since 1899. Since then, they’ve helped form more than 750,000 corporations and LLCs.
However, despite being in business since the 19th century and boasting nearly a million customers, there is little customer feedback available online for Incorporate.com. We found just a small handful of reviews on third-party review sites, and a large percentage of them were negative.
Incorporate.com offers phone, email, and chat support. We tested their chat function first and received a prompt response. The experience was just as we expected ― the support agent was knowledgeable and friendly and managed to answer our questions without a problem.
We also sent an email and received a detailed response in just over 24 hours. While we hoped for a quicker response, the level of detail they included was more than expected, which was a pleasant surprise.
When we called, we received a similar response to that via chat and email. Our question via phone was answered professionally but without as much detail as we received in the email. Once our question was answered, they did ask if there was anything else we needed help with.
If you don’t know what kind of business structure you want to form (LLC or corporation), their business formation wizard can help you figure it out. Not sure about which package is the right choice for you? Check out their pricing page. It’s not difficult to decide which one is right for you, as long as you remember that neither the CSCNavigator compliance tool nor the annual report service is included in the listed price.
Once you select a package, there’s a series of seven additional upsells to review before putting in your contact information and checking out. Since their website has a clean design, it was easy to find where to place an order and navigate through to the payment page.
When you reach the bottom of your order form, Incorporate.com gives you turnaround time estimates for both standard and expedited processing. Incorporate.com doesn’t commit to a same-day or overnight turnaround like some other services do. However, they said that they file ASAP once all of the information they need from the business owner is provided, which is a fair response.
Incorporate.com is an experienced company that’s capable of forming your LLC. Of course, they have quite a few reputable competitors, so we’ll wrap this review up by going over some scenarios where you may or may not want to use Incorporate.com for your LLC formation.
If you place a high value on experience, a company that’s been around since 1899 likely appeals to you, and their Corporate Compliance Guarantee is a nice safety net.
If you want to save money, there are plenty of options. Another factor is that some competitors have a better history when it comes to customer feedback. For instance, at ZenBusiness, we’ll form your LLC for free and we have 12,000+ positive reviews.
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Is Incorporate.com legit?
Incorporate.com was originally formed as the Corporation Service Company in 1899. Over the years, they’ve changed their name twice — first to The Company Corporation and then to Incorporate.com — but their core service remains the same: to make it easier for companies to form business entities.
Despite the fact that they’ve been around for over a century, there are only a few reviews available for Incorporate.com, so it’s tough to analyze their customer reputation.
How does Incorporate.com compare to other LLC providers?
It’s normal to be uncertain about which online LLC formation service is the right choice for your unique business. After all, there are a ton of options out there, and each of them has its own set of advantages and disadvantages.
However, we’ve done countless hours of research on this topic, reviewing and comparing all of the best LLC formation services. We invite you to check out some of our comparison guides, which take a head-to-head view of the competition between Incorporate.com and its top competitors.
Incorporate.com vs. ZenBusiness: While Incorporate.com charges at least $99, we’ll form your LLC for free — just pay your state’s required fee. In addition, we receive excellent customer feedback, with thousands of reviews available and very few negative ones to be found.
Incorporate.com vs. Northwest Registered Agent: Overall, Northwest Registered Agent lives up to its name, as this company includes a full year of its namesake registered agent service with each formation package. However, at $225, its LLC formations are more expensive than the other options in this guide. If you don’t want registered agent service, Incorporate.com can save you some money on your LLC formation, but its $235/year registered agent service costs more than Northwest’s package, which includes both features.
Incorporate.com vs. Incfile: Like us at ZenBusiness, Incfile offers a free business formation package, so they come out ahead of Incorporate.com in the value proposition. Compared to many of its Incfile alternatives, Incfile also receives strong customer feedback, with thousands upon thousands of positive reviews. Incorporate.com clearly has more longevity than Incfile, but that’s the only area where they have an advantage.
Incorporate.com vs LegalZoom: LegalZoom recently debuted a free LLC formation package, matching ZenBusiness and Incfile in this area. Even though Incorporate.com has been open for many more years, LegalZoom has a higher volume of customers served, with more than 4 million compared to Incorporate.com’s 750,000 customers.
Customer feedback is another advantage for LegalZoom over some of its LegalZoom alternatives. While its reviews aren’t quite as impressive as those of ZenBusiness or Incfile, LegalZoom still has thousands of reviews, and most of them are positive.
Does Incorporate.com offer any discounts?
Unfortunately, we are not aware of any discount codes for Incorporate.com. We looked far and wide hoping to find a way for our readers to save money with Incorporate.com, but we came up empty. Incorporate.com has reasonable pricing to begin with, but it’s disappointing that there aren’t any ways to knock their rates down a bit.
Other than LLC formation, what else can Incorporate.com do?
Incorporate.com offers many services to help you maintain your compliant business entity, including annual reports, business licenses and permits, bylaws and operating agreements, registered agent service, Certificates of Good Standing, certified copies, stock and membership certificates, written consent forms, and more.
In addition, they provide assistance with IRS filings, including EIN acquisition, LLC tax status election, and nonprofit status. Finally, they offer mail forwarding, along with a handful of miscellaneous filings, like DBA registrations, foreign qualifications, amendments, entity conversions, dissolutions, and reinstatements.
Does Incorporate.com have good customer support?
Incorporate.com provides pretty standard customer support compared to other companies in this industry. They have phone and email support, and the quality of their service is good but seems to vary a bit from representative to representative.
Do they have a refund policy?
In their own words, “If you cancel your order before we have submitted it to a federal, state, or local office, Incorporate.com will refund the total amount paid for such order less a service fee. If you cancel your order after we have already submitted it, we will use our discretion to determine what portion, if any, we will refund.”
Can I form an LLC on my own?
You certainly do always have this option, and some entrepreneurs do form their own LLCs. If you want to try the DIY route, we would caution you that it can be more work than you might expect because every state has different compliance requirements. On the other end of the spectrum, some people hire lawyers to form their LLCs, but this option is usually much more expensive than using a business incorporation service.
Should I reserve my LLC name before forming an LLC?
Each state has a way to reserve a business name before forming your entity itself. In general, this is only necessary if you aren’t yet ready to enter the formation process.
If you’re ready to start your business, there’s no reason to reserve your name before forming your LLC. We’ll note that certain states (like Alabama) require you to reserve a name before you form your business.
Can I form an LLC without physically being in the United States?
Yes, there’s no requirement that you be present in the U.S. to form an LLC. In fact, you don’t need to be a U.S. citizen or resident to form an LLC either, as foreign nationals are allowed to own and operate LLCs just like U.S. citizens are.
Do they handle requirements like New York publication?
We called Incorporate.com’s customer support and found out that they don’t offer assistance with publication requirements because “publication isn’t part of the business formation” but rather is a step that comes after the LLC’s successful formation. If you’re looking for a company that will take care of publication requirements on your behalf, check out our New York publication service.
What is the Incorporate.com customer support phone number and email?
You can contact Incorporate.com via phone by calling 855-236-4043. Instead of publishing a specific email address, they have an email contact form on their website. Once you submit your message, an Incorporate.com representative will reach out to you via email as soon as possible, typically within one business day.
I’ve heard LegalZoom has a lot of upsells. Does Incorporate.com?
Unfortunately, similar to LegalZoom, this is one area where Incorporate.com falters a bit. Simply put, they just about do everything they can to get you to sign up for their registered agent service, which costs $235 per year. On their LLC formation package select screen, they have a couple of features listed that are not included with each package.
The “Access to online tool: CSCNavigator” and “Annual Report Prep & File” features do not come with your formation package. If you read the fine print, you’ll realize that these features are only accessible to customers who also purchase registered agent service from Incorporate.com.
How quickly does Incorporate.com process LLC formations?
Incorporate.com’s processing times vary depending on your state of formation, but in general, they’re pretty fast. If you need to speed up your formation turnaround time, you can upgrade to their expedited service which can reduce your processing time from weeks down to just a few days in some states.
Is it worth the extra $80 to get an EIN?
This is a tough question to answer without knowing the specific needs of your unique business. We enjoy getting an EIN included with our LLC formation, even if it means spending extra to add it on or to upgrade to a higher level of LLC service.
The convenience of not having to get one ourselves through the IRS is worth it for us, and we like to have our Articles of Organization and EIN confirmation in the same place. However, we would completely understand if you’d rather save the money and acquire your own EIN from the IRS directly.
What are Incorporate.com’s biggest advantage and disadvantage?
Incorporate.com’s biggest advantage is its longevity. After all, any company that can stay in business for 120+ years must be doing something right. Their biggest disadvantage is their pricing, as you can find just about everything Incorporate.com sells at a lower price with one of their competitors.
Does Incorporate.com help with ongoing compliance requirements?
They do offer a couple of different services to help you stay compliant into the future. Their registered agent service costs $235 per year to add to your LLC or incorporation service, and they also offer annual report service at an annual rate of $150. As a reminder, you cannot purchase the Essentials or Works packages without also buying both of these additional services.
LLC Services Reviewed
Disclaimer: The content on this page is for information purposes only and does not constitute legal, tax, or accounting advice. If you have specific questions about any of these topics, seek the counsel of a licensed professional.
Written by Team ZenBusiness
ZenBusiness has helped people start, run, and grow over 800,000 dream companies. The editorial team at ZenBusiness has over 20 years of collective small business publishing experience and is composed of business formation experts who are dedicated to empowering and educating entrepreneurs about owning a company.
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