Washington LLC

The Washington Secretary of State requires an initial report be filed by all limited liability companies. The Initial Annual Report is due within 120 days of your initial filing and will cost $10.00. The annual report is due by the end of the month you filed in and will cost $69.00.

Washington charges a gross income tax of 1.5% on your revenue after your first $35,000 of gross receipts. Washington calls this a business and occupations tax, or better known in the State as a B & O tax. They track this information by using your Washington State UBI (Unified Business Identifier) number.

There are basically no deductions. Washington State will deduct the money you made in another State and paid taxes for there, which can make it a very attractive State to own a national company in.

There is no personal income tax in Washington State.

The average Washington sales tax rate is 8.78%. The State has a 6.5% tax, but the average local tax is 2.28% making a total of 8.78%.

To form a Washington LLC, you file Washington certificate of formation. The Washington certificate of formation cost $180.00 with the Washington Secretary of State. These can be basic or complicated. We custom draft your Washington certificate of formation when you hire Northwest to form your Washington Company. The basic requirements are:

• The business name must have a LLC ending or variation of it.
• The Washington company name must be different than already registered Washington companies.
• The address of the principal place of business of the Washington Limited Liability Company.
• The effective date of the LLC in Washington.
• Duration of the Washington LLC.
• Management type – manager(s)/member(s).
• The Washington registered agent name, physical address and signed consent.
• Name, address, phone number and signature of all executor.

Washington does not require original inked signatures on filings. The original will come back to the Washington LLC agent or the address on the form.

1. You file the certificate of formation for a Washington LLC with the Washington Secretary of State.
   Washington requires an initial report within 120 days of filing.
2. You obtain a federal tax ID number with the IRS after you have confirmation from Washington that the certificate is completely filed.
3. You should be able to open a business banking account with these two items.
4. You register your Washington Company with the Department of Revenue or Labor if you're going to have employees or need to withhold sales tax.
5. You obtain a trade license, if you actually need one. (Most businesses don't.)
6. You obtain a local City or County general license, if you need one.
7. You obtain a local trade license, if the City or County you're going to be working in requires it.
8. If you're going to have an office or shop, you might need an approval from the city zoning for your type of business in that location.

NOW!! I always give out horrible advice at this point, and please don't take it as legal advice. It would be considered totally wrong and horrible legal advice. BUT… I always tell people, you could spend months worrying about getting your Washington business off the ground and registering with every Washington State agency that a Washington LLC could find. The bottom line is that you need to pull the money in! That means, your idea, or your new service needs to get out there and get the sales, customers, or clients you need to get the money in the bank, and keep your LLC in Washington going. At the end of the day, Money in the bank trumps fines with some Washington government agency that you overlooked paying some silly fee to. The government is always going to be broke and always looking for the next way to make us pay a fee or tax. We unfortunately see Washington LLCs every year that just shut down 6 to 7 months after they hired us to form the LLC for them in Washington, because they never got the idea off the ground. I always say, pull the money in first, deal with a Washington State agency second. If you have to pay some late fees or fines, but you landed that first big client that gets your business off of the idea you have on that paper notebook, I say more power to you. Pay the late fee or fine with joy. You've done the REAL first step to starting your Washington business. Get out there and pull the money in! If some Washington State agency finds you're in some violation, they will send you a letter, and you can pay whatever they are asking for. It's a never-ending phone call or email I get hearing about all the effort someone's put into their website, into their letterhead, into their marketing, into their planning, and they haven't even figured out how they are realistically going to get and collect their first sale. Don't let over-planning stop your business from getting off the ground. Paying a Washington LLC formation service like us to do the initial paperwork is a great way to keep your brain moving on the important items like pulling in the money and getting it into your new business bank account.

We pay taxes in Washington. We operate a business in Washington. We're not an incorporation website. We're a Washington incorporation and registered agent business. There are lots of websites out there that are just websites with generic domain names and smart programmers that can make them rank in Google.

Anyone could throw up a website, hire sales people to answer the phones with scripts, and pay a document filer $10.00 an hour to file the Washington certificate of formation with the State for you to form an LLC in Washington. If you've found this page by searching online, most the other sites you'll find don't operate in Washington, don't pay taxes in Washington, and generally speaking, don't have any idea what it's like in Washington. The only people here helping you form a Washington LLC are the owner, our in-house, non-practicing attorney, and our paralegal. This is all we do, and when you hire us and pay us $100.00 to form a Washington LLC, the owner pays Washington tax at the end of the year off that $100.00, and the $125.00 Washington registered agent service fees.

When we form a Washington LLC, we'll be your Washington LLC agent. That means our Washington office is in Spokane, Washington, and we have a physical presence in Washington, so we have to pay income tax off the money we derive from doing business in Washington. It's called “Nexus.” If you're shopping around for a Washington LLC formation service, we would challenge you to call one of the other LLC filing services and ask the person that answers the phone if they have nexus in Washington. If they don't, or don't have any idea what that word even means, that would be kind of like hiring a real estate agent in Boise, Idaho, to sell your home in Seattle, Washington. Just doesn't sound right does it? If they do have nexus in Washington, then that's Great… At least you're then comparing us with another company that should know what they are doing, and you've ultimately done yourself a favor. While you're on the phone comparing apples to apples, you should ask the company what the name and address will be of the Washington registered agent, and how much the renewal bill will be. If they can't tell you the name, the town the office will be in, and if it's not their own name, it means you're ultimately signing up with someone you don't know.

We've seen other sites with packages that include Washington LLC agent service, or offer it free for 6 months or a year, or it's just built into a “Package.” But you're paying a website, and they then list another person or Washington company as your agent. Then you get a bill at the end of the 6 months or year from some random company you've never heard of for a lot of money. Our Washington registered agent service is $125.00 a year, has no hidden weird fees, and the first year is included in our Washington LLC service.

• 1 year of service from the time of hire.
• Annual report reminders for your LLC in Washington.
• Annual report calendar in your online account to track your due dates in Washington.
• Online account for contact info, corporate documents, documents we receive on your behalf, annual report dates, calendar, and end of service dates.
• Any lawsuits or service of process are uploaded to your account immediately, in full, for your viewing. We can notify your attorney at the same time if you would like. We can notify up to 5 different people and your attorney of your lawsuit instantly.
• Added privacy and identity protection.
• All junk mail is shredded.
• Same day complete scan of received documents. (Other registered agents forward items received locally to their National headquarters by mail, and then scan them. You get everything the same day from us.)
• No cancellation fees.
• No forwarding fees.
• We don't keep your credit card on file and automatically charge you for anything.

The requirements of a registered agent are being open during normal business hours for someone (A process server or Sheriff) to walk in and hand deliver a document or notification to you. Assigning someone, or a website you don't know to this role means that if you get a notification by mail or someone delivers a letter or a lawsuit to that person or business, its legal proof that you've been notified, regardless of if it actually gets to you. There are only 5 national registered agents, and there's thousands of LLC forming websites, so the odds are that if you pay one of the thousands of LLC formation websites, they've got a discounted referral fee plan to dump you on one of the national agents to collect a referral fee, and you'll be taking a big chance that the person they list will get the documents they receive for you to the incorporation website, and then the incorporation website you hire will get it to you. It is worse yet is if you are continually being billed from a national LLC formation website you signed up with and they aren't the actual business or person that is listed as your registered agent. With us, you know who you're counting on from day one. As far as we know we are the only service that uploads all complete documents instantly, from our local location to your account.

We will form a Washington LLC for you right away. No weird expedite packages. No weird tables with checkmarks showing what's included and what you're missing. We don't mark up the State filing fees for an LLC. Our sign up form is one page. After filling it out, our owner, our non-practicing attorney, or our paralegal will call you right away, go over everything with you, and we'll get your new Washington Company formed right away. We'll be listed as your Washington registered agent, not some random company you don't know. Most States have a change of agent fee, so not only could you be connected with a company you don't really know, it will cost you to get rid of them after you get a crazy renewal bill you weren't expecting. We make our living by keeping your business in compliance with Washington, year after year. Not off weird misleading one time package fees and up-sells.

Shouldn't you trust a Washington business that actually operates and pays taxes in Washington instead of a website with a 500 filing backlog that you have to upgrade a package with to get some quick attention?

If you want to form a Washington Limited Liability Company yourself, you can just hire us as your Washington registered agent, and you'll instantly have the Washington forms to file and filing instructions on the quickest, cheapest, and most efficient way to file a Washington LLC. We also will look over your filing for free if you would like us to. You'll get the ongoing support of our online tools, compliance reminders and the support of a professional Washington LLC Agent service.