Washington Registered Agent
In Washington, your registered agent lists their name and address on your business formation documents. This puts their information on public record and makes them the go-to person for your state and legal mail.
As a local PNW business, we know how important privacy is. That’s why when you hire Northwest, we put our address in place of yours anywhere we can. Get automatic compliance, Privacy by Default®, and support from fellow Washingtonians.
When You Want More
- $125 a Year
- Business Address & Mail Scanning
- Instant Domain, Website, Email & Phone Line
- Automatic Brand Protection
- Privacy By Default®
What Is a Registered Agent?
Washington’s registered agent regulations not only require registered business entities to have a registered agent, that registered agent must also:
- Have a physical address (no P.O. Boxes or virtual offices) in the state of Washington
- Keep regular business hours (9 AM to 5 PM)
Essentially, your registered agent’s address acts as the official place where any service of process and official mail for your Washington LLC, Washington corporation or Washington nonprofit will be sent. If your business is ever served with a lawsuit, the process server will deliver the paperwork directly to your registered agent. At that point, your business is legally considered served. The registered agent should then forward you your mail, quickly and securely.
Are you privacy minded? Would a completely unique physical street address in Washington be helpful for your business? Our Virtual office in Washington and Premium Mail Forwarding in Washington Services are an excellent value.
You should hire us first and then form your LLC or corporation. Your business registration filing will be rejected if you don’t already have a registered agent. You’ll find all the forms and instructions you need to complete your filing instantly after you place an order.
To start, a process server, the county sheriff, or a third party will walk into our office and hand us the documents (service of process), which we sign for.
Next, the process server gives an affidavit (a receipt of service) to the court as confirmation that they served us.
Note: If you’ve hired Northwest, you’ve received your documents long before the process server hands in their affidavit to the court—because we scanned them to your online account within minutes of having been served.
Change Your Registered Agent
There are two ways to change your registered agent in Washington. You can keep it simple and hire Northwest. We’ll complete the change of agent form for you for free. Or, do it yourself and file a Statement of Change for Registered Agent form with the Washington Secretary of State. There is no fee to file this form.
Yes, you can be your own registered agent in Washington. However, after considering the registered agent requirements, most business owners elect to hire a registered agent service instead.
Why? Well although being your own registered agent will cost you $0 upfront, a registered agent’s name and WA address becomes part of the public record.
Additionally, the registered agent is required to be available to accept service of process during normal business hours five days a week.
In Washington, to resign as a registered agent, you need to submit a Statement of Resignation of Registered Agent online, by mail or in-person to the Washington Secretary of State. For a more detailed walkthrough, you can refer to our guide on how to resign as a registered agent in Washington State.
To find a company’s registered agent:
- Perform a WA business name search with Washington’s Secretary of State (SOS).
- Type in the name of the company whose registered agent you are trying to look up.
- Look for the Washington registered agent name and registered office street address.
If you want to legally notify someone through their registered agent, send a certified letter directly to the registered agent name and registered office address listed on the SOS’s website.
Our Washington Registered Agent Service
Northwest is the best registered agent in Washington. Our service includes the tools you need to keep your business running without a hitch. When you hire Northwest as your registered agent, you get:
- Same-Day scans: We scan your legal docs the same day we receive them and reach out if your essential mail goes unread.
- Mail forwarding: We accept and scan all your state and legal mail, and will scan up to five personal documents for free. We also offer unlimited Washington mail forwarding and Washington Virtual Office Service.
- Privacy by Default®: We list our business address on public docs to keep your personal info safe. And unlike our competition, we never sell your data.
- Corporate Guides®: Have questions? Our Corporate Guides® have answers. Real people, not robots. Smart, experienced business experts that are here to help with whatever you throw at them.
- Brand Protection: Keep an eye on your business name, domains, and trademarks, with built-in Brand Protection. We’ll alert you to potential conflicts early, and give you simple tools to build and manage your brand all in one place, totally free.
Want more? Of course you do. Northwest automatically gives all of our customers a full Business Identity. That means you get a domain that aligns with your business name, a customizable website, a legit business email, and a separate phone line all at no extra charge. You’ll look like a pro and your personal info stays yours.
We accept and scan all of our Washington clients’ documents on-site at our registered office in downtown Spokane, WA.
Definitely! We’re the only national registered agent service that allows our clients to list our address for everything when you’re doing a filing to keep your private address off public records.
While you can use our address, we are not a return depot for online or Amazon sellers, though we’d love to accept your foosball tables. We don’t want ALL of your business mail. It’s not what we do. And it wouldn’t serve you well. You wouldn’t have a unique address or suite number. Any mail we receive on your behalf would come to Northwest Registered Agent, care of you.
But we understand that businesses and clients sometimes reach out to you through your registered agent. Through us. That’s why we give you five FREE scans of regular business mail a year.
As your registered agent we allow the use of our address wherever it is accepted. We want your information to be as secure as possible. However, Amazon changed their Terms of Service to start a business account and now requires additional documentation such as utility bills and more, which registered agents cannot provide.
Order WA Registered Agent Service
You sign up online, clicking on one of the buttons or links that says HIRE US.
We collect the first year of the Registered Agent Service fee up front.
For new businesses, we’ll become your Washington registered agent once your business registration filing with the Washington Secretary of State is complete.
About a year later, we’ll send you an invoice for another year of Registered Agent Service. If you want to keep using us, great; if you don’t, you can easily cancel.
With offices in every state, we make it easy to add registered agent services anywhere in the country. We don’t farm out work (or your info) to other companies—wherever you are, WE are your registered agent.
We make your account a real go-to resource for you, not just for Registered Agent Service or paying a bill but for keeping up with Washington corporate compliance.
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