How much does legalzoom charge

In some states, the articles are called a "certificate of organization. Our team is available 7 days a week to answer questions about your new business documents, personalized packet, and related products and services. We include 20 personalized company membership certificates and an official company seal to record ownership in your business.

If you select Express Gold, we prioritize your order and rush our process to complete it within business days. With an average of 15 years of experience and an average customer rating of 4. And if anything comes up, we'll let you know. We do right by you—so we'll refund our fee within the first 60 days of purchase if you're unhappy with our services.

Call or email us, and we'll process your refund within 5 business days. We can't refund third-party processing fees e. And, we can't refund filing fees once we submit your paperwork to the government. Attorney fees paid directly to lawyers and not through our legal plans are not covered.

We can't guarantee specific legal outcomes when you use our products or services. For example, a trademark application might be filled out correctly but still get rejected by the government for reasons beyond our control. We can only refund our fee for issues we're directly responsible for.

So if you purchase something and later change your mind, we can't issue a refund. For Registered Agent Services customers, you will first need to appoint a new registered agent for your business. If you need help locating the correct government form to change your registered agent with the state, please reach out to our Customer Care team.

LegalZoom offers a ton of legal and filing-related services. The company — which is not a law firm — nevertheless assists with everything from living wills to property deed transfers to estate planning to personal name changes.

LegalZoom offers three formation packages. The Economy, the Standard, and the Express Gold all offer formations, with higher-tier packages offering additional services. With LegalZoom, however, the more expensive packages include almost no additional essential services. We explain what they actually provide below. While the package prices are pretty standard, LegalZoom requires you to buy essential services separately — at extremely high prices.

The stated turnaround time under this plan is 30 business days. They include basic information on your business, like its name, member s , address, and industry. Financial Account Authorization Letter : This document will apply to any business owner who is looking to start a business bank account.

Lifetime Customer Support : This is a big plus since LegalZoom offers seven-day-a-week customer support. Unlike some of their smaller competitors, LegalZoom has a large team dedicated to customer service. The overall expected turnaround time, though, is still a relatively slow 15 business days. Official Certificates, Seal, and Organizer: Included with the Standard plan are a personalized organizer, company seal, and 20 company membership certificates.

It includes everything offered with the Standard plan, plus:. Express shipping: Just what it sounds like. Any relevant documents will be shipped to you express. They are standardized for comparison with competitors. Basic Formation: Covers the essential business entity creation. Includes — at minimum — filing of Articles of Organization and the drafting of an Operating Agreement for an LLC or corporate bylaws for a corporation.

Full Formation: Additionally includes — at minimum — a registered agent service, which most owners will find essential. Are you looking for a more in-depth comparison between LegalZoom and some of their competitors? We firmly recommend ZenBusiness over LegalZoom. Compared to ZenBusiness, LegalZoom performed poorly in several categories.

Despite this, LegalZoom does not offer any meaningful added value compared to ZenBusiness. ZenBusiness can provide faster and more affordable formations while also boasting much higher levels of customer satisfaction. Check out our ZenBusiness vs. LegalZoom article for our full comparison. Northwest Registered Agent performs vastly better than LegalZoom when it comes to pricing and turnaround time. Northwest Registered Agent also scores higher in terms of customer satisfaction.

Check out our Northwest Registered Agent vs. Overall, we think neither Nolo nor LegalZoom are good options and recommend using other services. Check out our LegalZoom vs. Nolo article for our full comparison. These services are bundled with Rocket Lawyers membership by default. Rocket Lawyer also scores significantly better with online customer reviews and offers much better pricing. Rocket Lawyer article for our full comparison.

Both Incfile and LegalZoom have significant shortcomings in different categories, which is why we recommend neither of them. Incfile article for our full comparison. Neither LegalZoom nor BizFilings offer the best turnaround times or most affordable prices in the business.

And while LegalZoom scores higher regarding ease-of-use and customer service, their high costs are the reason why we ultimately rank BizFilings above LegalZoom. BizFilings article for our full comparison. That said, both services have issues. We do not recommend either of them. For example, Inc Authority could do a better job of informing people about their pricing and services.

They also heavily upsell third-party services. On the other hand, Inc Authority performs better concerning pricing and turnaround time.

Inc Authority article for our full comparison. Still, other services can get the job done even faster than either of these companies. Swyft Filings also tends to upsell unnecessary services or outsource them to third parties. Swyft Filings article for our full comparison. LegalZoom performs significantly better than Incorporate. However, both services do poorly in the two most important categories — pricing and turnaround time.

As a result, we cannot recommend either of the two. The certificates, seal, and organizer are unnecessary for most businesses. Cancellations are not prorated. It does state that you have days from the beginning of service to cancel an order and still receive a refund or store credit. A separate page states that to request a refund for a service, you should contact the LegalZoom Customer Care Center at Smaller operators tend to rely on automated services, like chatbots. Here, LegalZoom benefits from its larger size.

One other big thing that LegalZoom has going for it is its long track record. Founded in , the company boasts a full two decades of experience. As a pioneer within the field, LegalZoom was one of the first companies to bring affordable legal services to the masses through efficient, online templates. Through the years, LegalZoom has maintained and even improved its reputation. Compared to some competitors, who have not been in the field for as long and still may be working on their service model, LegalZoom offers consistency.

Sometimes, larger businesses are more cumbersome than smaller ones. However, there are some benefits to being big, too. With over 1, employees, LegalZoom boasts a significantly larger workforce than many of its competitors. This translates to more customer service reps and support staff, and more specialists and experts who can help you work through tricky or confusing issues.

Some of its more specialized legal services, like IP protection, may not apply to all business owners. With smaller LLC formation specialists, you may be taking more of a shot in the dark. Take its formation packages, for instance. Neither of those packages, though, includes a registered agent service or an Operating Agreement.

In some states, the process for reserving an LLC name can often be done online, while others provide a name reservation form to download and mail. All LLCs must have a registered agent to accept service of process documents and other official notifications on behalf of the company. A registered agent may be an individual or a business. Costs for registered agents vary depending on whom you hire for this responsibility.

The most expensive filing fee you'll encounter when forming an LLC is for the articles of organization: the document on which you will divulge all of the basic details about the LLC, including its name and address, registered agent, and management structure.

The website of your state's Secretary of State or similar agency that handles LLC registration should list specific information about required fees. You may also choose to pay an additional fee to speed up the processing of your articles of organization. If your state, county, or city requires a business license or permits, you should add the fees associated with those documents to your LLC formation costs.

The Small Business Administration is a good resource for determining whether you need any special licenses and permits. Some states, though not all, require businesses to file annual reports or statements even within a few months of filing to form an LLC. The state may allow you to file your initial annual report along with the articles of organization. Some states also have additional LLC-related fees.

And speaking of taxes, tax registration may also be required in order to receive state notices about taxes.