Streamlining Annual Business Renewals in Minnesota: A Guide for Entrepreneurs
In Minnesota, business owners enjoy a straightforward and cost-free process for renewing their LLC or corporation annually. This unique advantage saves entrepreneurs both time and money, reducing the need for external legal or accounting assistance.
Why Annual Renewal Matters
Maintaining the active status of your business entity is vital for compliance with state laws. Without timely renewal, your LLC or corporation risks administrative termination, which could complicate legal and financial activities. Fortunately, Minnesota offers a renewal process that is not only simple but also free of charge.
Step-by-Step Guide to Renewing Your Business
The renewal process begins on the Minnesota Secretary of State website, where entrepreneurs can log in or set up a new account. Once logged in, you can easily locate your business in the registry by searching for its name. After finding your business, the option to renew will be prominently displayed.
Critical Details to Provide
During renewal, you’ll need to update or verify information about the business manager and the principal office address. This data is crucial as it becomes part of the public record, but thankfully, the owner’s details can remain private. Ensuring this information is accurate is essential for maintaining your business’s good standing.
Completing the Renewal Process
The renewal interface guides you through several steps, including confirming contact details where the Secretary of State will send any official notices. For privacy and convenience, these can be directed to your attorney’s email if preferred. The final step involves a review of all entered information before submission to avoid any errors.
Autonomy in Managing Legal Tasks
This guide empowers business owners to handle their legal tasks independently, saving on potential fees from professionals. By following these simple instructions, Minnesota entrepreneurs can ensure their business complies with state regulations without unnecessary expenses.
Expert Resources Available
For those who seek further assistance or have unique circumstances, resources like legal advice from experienced professionals are invaluable. Attorneys specializing in business law can provide tailored advice and support for more complex situations, ensuring your business not only survives but thrives.
Video Transcript
In most states, every year, you have to renew your LLC or corporation. In Minnesota, it is free. It only takes a couple of minutes, but a lot of times people wonder, “How do I do this?” And so they might pay an accountant or an attorney to do that. I am doing this video for my clients and for others who would like to be able to do this themselves.
Avoiding Unnecessary Costs
So you don’t have to pay an attorney or an accountant to file your annual renewal. Now, what happens if you don’t file your annual renewal? The LLC or corporation gets administratively terminated. Now, you can undo that by paying a filing fee and filing a form, but it is free to do the annual renewal.
Step-by-Step Renewal Guide
So I am going to show you quickly how to do that. First, we will hop into Google, and in Minnesota, the Minnesota Secretary of State has a section on business listings. So we go up here to the menu, go to business and liens.
Login and Business Search
Now what we want to do once we get here is to either sign in or, if you haven’t already, create an account. So, I have already set up an account. It is free. I am signing in right here. Now, once you get here, you just search for your business name. So we will click on that. Type in the name of the business, which I have blurred out here to protect my client’s information. Then you will find the business name listed right down at the bottom. And so we can go click on the details.
Filing the Renewal
There it is. And now, right up at the top is where you will see file amendment slash renewal. So we will click on that. It says pick which one. Now, domestic means it is a Minnesota LLC or a Minnesota corporation. And, as you can see here, that is free. So we are going to do the annual renewal for a limited liability company that was domestic or formed in Minnesota.
Manager and Principal Office Details
Now you fill out the name of the manager if you would like. Now I have blurred the information for confidentiality reasons here, but the manager, that is whoever is in charge of managing the business. It might be the president, the CEO, or sometimes you even have a company managing a business like a rental property business. So you put the name of the manager in there, and if it is a company, you click on the organization button, and then that information can be filled in.
Contact Details and Official Notices
The next section down is delivery information. That just means where should the Secretary of State send the confirmation? So typically, you want to put your name and email address there. As an attorney, I put my name and email address there because I want the information to go to me, not my client.
Additional Information and Review Process
Client reference information. If you are doing this for your own business, you won’t use this. This is for an attorney to put in a client’s name so that they can track who they are paying fees for if there are any fees. So just leave this blank. Email for official notices. In this section, you put the email address of the person. Who do you want to receive reminders that they need to renew their LLC or corporation? So most likely, that is you. Put your name and email address in this field.
Final Steps and Confirmation
Once you are done, you can go to the bottom, and you will see the next button. Go ahead and click that. Sometimes, if you click it, the information doesn’t get sent, and you will want to look back up and see if any errors on the page need to be corrected. The next question here is whether you want to use the post office’s standard address for that location or the address that you entered. You can choose either. Usually, it doesn’t make any difference.
Conclusion and Legal Resources
Next, you are asked to review all the information just to make sure it looks correct. Go ahead and look it over. Make sure everything is as you expected. When you are ready to move forward, click the submit button. And you are done. At least you are done submitting it. You can see here a little confirmation that the annual renewal has been filed. You have an order number here, and the Secretary of State has your contact information. That is it. Pretty straightforward. It is free. Once you get used to it, you can probably do it in about two minutes or less, but it took a little more time because we talked through it here.
Advice for Business Owners
If you have questions, the best approach is to reach out to your CPA or attorney to talk about how to do this. And if you have special circumstances, like your business in another state registering in Minnesota, that would be a foreign entity registration, or if you are doing this in your state, you may have different procedures, but this at least gives you a quick summary of how to renew an LLC or corporation here in Minnesota.
Additional Resources
I am Aaron Hall. I am an attorney for business owners and entrepreneurial companies. You can find me at AaronHall.com.
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