How Do I Cancel My Registered Agent?

What are the fees if I cancel?

There are no fees if you cancel service with us, unless you don't want to take care of the filing to take our name off as your agent, or to cancel your registration with the State. You can hire us to do this on your behalf if you would like. Generally, we would charge $30.00 plus the State filing fee to change the agent from us, and $60.00 to handle your business registration cancellation with the State. We would prefer that you just do it yourself.

If you would like to cancel service with us, send us proof that we are not listed as your agent anymore or that you have cancelled your registration with the State, and we will cancel your account with us for that State. Calling in and telling us you want to cancel our service doesn't cancel your service. We are listed as your registered agent and legally have to perform our service until you change registered agents, withdraw your foreign entity, dissolve your domestic entity, or we resign as agent. Once one of these has been done, mail verification to our main office and we'll get your account cancelled right away.

It's that simple! We're not going to argue with you over a bunch of fees when you're already not going to need our services moving forward. It's just not worth our time. Let's get our name off there, or your business registration cancelled, and move on! We want you to have a good experience with us from the first day to the last, so that next time you need a registered agent, you'll want to use us again.

TECHNICAL DETAILS:

If you get an annual registered agent bill from us, and you want to cancel service with us, we need to actually not be doing our job. If we are listed as the registered agent, we have a legal responsibility as your registered agent to accept service of process and notices. If we are still doing our job, we expect to be paid. Businesses come and go, and the core of our clients have us in multiple States. We totally understand if you need to cancel service with us. We don't want to be a hassle for you, and if you get an annual bill from us, it's coming about 2-3 months before your end of service date. That gives you plenty of time to dissolve your domestic company, withdraw your foreign entity, or change registered agents. Once you mail us proof of this filing to our main corporate headquarters, we will void out the invoice and close out your account with us if it's your last State. No hassles, no fees.

Failure to accomplish this will add late fees and ultimately cause us to resign as your registered agent with the State, causing your entity to lose it's good standing. This will not relieve your duties to the State, it will just create more of a mess for you.

If you're registering in multiple States or just operating a business in your home State, it will be to your benefit to get your business OFFICIALLY cancelled with the State. Failure to file your annual reports will only create a headache for you if you need to re-register or revive your company at some point. Furthermore, the Departments of Revenue and other State agencies in that State will be looking for continual returns, even if they are zero returns. Some States send out late notices and access fines and fees internally. It can add up to a real mess years down the road for you. Unfortunately, we get clients that don't want to do this, and then we hear from them years later that it cost them thousands of dollars to get their company going again, when it would have cost them almost nothing and a couple of hours of their time to get their business officially closed down with the State.

Here are the three options to cancel service with us:

1. If you have a domestic entity and want to close your business, you need to dissolve it with the Secretary of State. Sometimes you may have to get a Department of Revenue clearance before the Secretary of State will allow this. Sometimes, it's as simple as filing an informational form with the Secretary of State that doesn't cost anything. We provide these forms in your online account in the resources section.
2. If you have a foreign entity registered with a certificate of authority, and want to get out of that State, you need to withdraw or cancel the registrations. This also may require a Department of Revenue clearance before the Secretary of State. We provide these forms for you in your online account in the resources section.

Mail us verification of this filing to our corporate headquarters and we will void out the invoice if it's not overdue, and close out your account if it's your last State. Even just a printout of your business online showing inactive or us not listed as the agent is fine. You can look up your business using our Secretary of State page: http://www.northwestregisteredagent.com/secretary-of-state.html

We always try to provide our clients with helpful information on registering their business, keeping it going and finally closing it down. We had a huge group of contractors register with us for a big project in Virginia. Some of them wrapped up their business correctly because of our cancellation project, others didn't. A couple years later we re-registered one of them for another project and he tried using some of the same sub contractors. the ones that didn't close down their business correctly ended up spending more money on fines and fees than if they just would have left it going and paid our annual registered agent bill and the State annual report fee of $50.00. Our clients usually don't switch from us because of a lack of service. You'll make both our lives easier next time you need to get your business going again if you will take the time to wrap up your business with the State you're in.