Applying for New Hampshire authority without a preparer: forms, steps and snags

An LLC uses Form FLLC-1 and a corporation uses Form 40. The state's fee list shows each with a File Online link. Professional LLCs have their own version, Form FPLLC-1.

First, copy the exact corporate name. Second, write the principal office as a street address. Third, list the current directors and officers. Fourth, name the agent. Fifth, have an officer sign. Sixth, file with $100.

Print legibly in black, on standard letter paper with 1 inch margins, sign it and send one original. Use tracked delivery and keep a copy. For corporation forms, the notes say checks are deposited on receipt and a cashed check does not prove acceptance.

The fee is $100. Electronic payment adds $2. A trade name application, if your name is unavailable, adds $50. The in-person expedite is $25. Check the total on the payment screen before you confirm it.

A corporation's principal office must be a street address, though a post office box may be added to it. An LLC's registered office must be the agent's street address, so a box will not do.

The office posts its current processing date on its online notice board, and the date varies. If a mailed corporation form has produced no stamped copy within 30 days of acceptance, tell us. If a filing is returned, tell us before sending a second payment.

A name off by a comma from the home record, an agent from out of state, a signer without authority, and a good standing statement made before the home report was filed. A corporation's form also needs the signature of an officer of the kind the notes name.

Compare the name on the form with the home-state record character by character. Look at commas, periods, ampersands and the ending. If the same name is in use in New Hampshire, the form carries a substitute and a trade name application follows at $50.

The signer vouches for the statements on the form, so pick someone who can read the home record and has authority under home law. For a corporation the choice is among the officers the notes name.

State fee $100, online charge $2, substitute name $50, in-person expedite $25, first report $100. Those are the amounts you can meet before the first year ends.

Keep a copy of the filed form, the confirmation, the approved record, the agent's signed agreement and the reporting dates. Store them with the entity's home-state records.

The state fee is paid with the filing, so decide on the entity, the agent and the signer before you submit. If you pay and then spot a mistake, tell us before you file a second time.

Ask the corporation's secretary for the current list of directors and officers before you start. The form needs each name with a usual business address, and an out-of-date list holds a corporate form up.

$199 plus the state fee, including your first year of registered agent service; after that the agent service renews at $149 a year.