Texas Registered Agent
Any corporation or LLC doing business in Texas need a Texas registered agent to stay in good standing under state law. A professional registered agent service like Northwest can handle the bureaucratic red tape of compliance for you, while you do the real work of running your business.
Our office in Austin is just a stone’s throw from the Secretary of State’s office, so your business gets a local address for all your state paperwork—and we’ll forward that legal mail to wherever you are, from El Paso to Texarkana, even to other states. Want more? Northwest is the only registered agent that can provide your business services from domains to DBAs easily, and all in-house.
Para nuestros propietarios de negocios de habla hispana, tenemos representantes listos para responder sus preguntas relacionadas con el servicio de Agente Registrado. Comuníquese con nosotros al 509-267-1307.
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?
A Texas registered agent is a person or company that you choose to receive legal mail (like service of process) on behalf of your business. Registered agents give the public an official and reliable way to contact your business.
If your business gets served with a lawsuit, a process server will deliver the paperwork directly to your registered agent. At that point, your business has been legally served, and your registered agent should forward your mail to you quickly and securely.
Per Texas registered agent requirements (Title 1 Sec. 5.201), registered agents are legally required in Texas. At a minimum, your registered agent must list a physical address on the public record and be present at that address during business hours. But ideally, a registered agent for your Texas LLC or corporation should do more.
How Do I Change My Registered Agent?
There are two ways to change your registered agent in Texas.
- Hire us and we’ll complete the change of agent form for you for free.
- Do it yourself and file a Change of Registered Agent form with the Texas Secretary of State. The fee to file this form is $15.
It’s a relatively simple process, but for a more in-depth look, see our guide on how to change your registered agent in Texas.
Why Northwest Is the Best Registered Agent in Texas
Our Texas Registered Agent Service includes the tools you need to keep your business running without a hitch. When you hire Northwest as your registered agent service, 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 regular pieces of business mail for free. We also offer unlimited mail forwarding in Texas. Or you can get a virtual office in Texas that includes mail forwarding, an office lease, and a local phone number.
- Privacy by Default®: We list our business address on public docs to keep your personal info safe. And unlike those other guys, we never sell your data.
- Corporate Guides®: Have questions? We have answers. Our guides are business experts whose sole job is to provide support for all your business questions.
- Business Identity: Northwest is a Business Identity provider. Get a domain name that matches your business name. Tack on website hosting, we’ll get you an expert-built website, hosted and secured by us. Want to start talking to suppliers, advertisers, customers, and more? Set up business email addresses and a separate business phone number so you can protect your data and keep your communication professional.
- 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.
How to Order TX Registered Agent Service
You sign up online, clicking on one of the buttons or links that says HIRE US.
We collect the first year’s fee for registered agent service up front.
For new businesses, once you complete business registration filing with the Texas Secretary of State, we’ll become your registered agent in the Lone Star State.
About a year later, we’ll send 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.
It’s easy to add registered agent services in other states if your business expands. We have offices in every state. 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 Texas corporate paperwork formalities.
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TX Registered Agent FAQs
- State law requires all legitimate, registered businesses to appoint one. So if you’re running a nonprofit, you’ll also need a registered agent for your Texas nonprofit.
- The Secretary of State will reject your business filing if you don’t appoint a registered agent.
- A registered agent requirement gives the public and the state a reliable way to contact your business.
Yes, you can be your own registered agent. It might be a good option if you’re worried about the cost of a registered agent in Texas, since the price is $0. However, after considering the requirements most business owners elect to hire a registered agent service instead.
Although being your own registered agent is free, a Texas registered agent’s name and address becomes part of the public record. Additionally, a company’s registered agent is required to be available to accept service of process during normal business hours five days a week.
We accept and scan all of our Texas clients’ documents on-site at our registered office in Austin, TX.
Yes! Each year, you have to file the Texas Franchise Tax Report with the Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts (but you’ll only owe the tax if your business had at least $2,470,000 in business revenue the prior year). There are lots of penalties and fees if your franchise tax is past due, so you don’t want to forget to file.
We always send reminders based on the May 15 Texas Franchise Tax due date. Our sophisticated business compliance reminder system does the work for you on the back end, providing you not only with a reminder, but the forms to file populated with your info on them. This is all included with our Texas Registered Agent Service.
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 out of public records.
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, aka us. That’s why we give you five FREE scans of regular business mail a year. You can view any additional documents for $15. If you want those documents mailed to you, you’ll need to pay for shipping and handling.
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.
You should hire us first and then form your LLC or corporation. The Texas Secretary of State will reject your business registration filing if you don’t already have a registered agent. You’ll instantly find all the forms and instructions you need to complete your filing after you place an order.
Serving a registered agent is legal proof of notification. Whether you receive the documents your Texas registered agent signs for or not, you’ve legally been notified once they accept the documents. This is a serious responsibility and we don’t take it lightly. Here’s how it works:
- A process server, the county sheriff, or any third party will walk into our office and hand us the documents (service of process), and then we sign for them.
- The process server then gives an affidavit (a receipt of service) to the court which states that they served us.
- If you hire us, long before the server hands in their affidavit to the court, you’ll receive your documents. That’s because we scan them to your online account within minutes of accepting service of process.
You can find a company’s registered agent by running a Texas business search.
- Type in the company name you are trying to look up.
- Look at the TX registered agent name and registered office street address.
If you want to legally notify someone through their Texas registered agent service, just send a certified letter directly to the registered agent name and registered office address.
In Texas, to resign as a registered agent, you need to submit two copies of the Resignation of Registered Agent to the Texas Secretary of State, Corporations Division. For a more detailed walkthrough, you can refer to our guide on how to resign as a registered agent in Texas.