Setting up a Florida based corporation has been streamlined to the point where it can be done in two simple steps, on the Internet, in about 30 minutes. Even better you don’t need to use one of those “Corporation in a box” type companies to do it for you, you can very easily do it yourself, potentially saving yourself hundreds of dollars.
Step One is the formation of the Corporation. You can start by going to the Florida Department of State, Division of Corporations website, the cleverly named www.sunbiz.org.
At the top of the page you’ll see a menu and one of the menu items is E-Filing Services. Click that and a sub-menu pops up with several options. For the sake of this example let’s assume you want to set up a Limited Liability Corporation or an LLC.
If you select that option you’re taken to a page where you can begin the process. Just accurately follow the steps and you’ll have your LLC established in about 10 – 15 minutes. Total cost, including a certificate of good standing is about $130. The cost is actually less if you’re setting up a Corporation rather than an LLC.
So that’s step one – you’ve established your Florida Limited Liability Corporation.
Step two – obtain your Federal ID number. This step two has been greatly simplified by the IRS. The only problem I had with this step was navigating around the dead links at the IRS website.
Obtaining a Federal ID number requires the completion of form SS4, which can be done electronically. The link I found that actually worked for getting the Federal ID number is at the IRS.gov website here. This page explains the process with links, hopefully still live, to the e-form that you’ll complete. Once you complete the form you’ll get a PDF version of the IRS letter with your new Federal ID number.
Total cost to obtain the Federal ID number online? Zero.
This method may not be right for people who have never established businesses before as there are a number of things that you need to understand before setting up a corporation. But if you’ve done it the old fashioned way in the past, you’ll find that the process has been seriously streamlined.
