BUSINESS REGISTRATION

In most cities or municipalities of Canada and the USA, the governments require most businesses to be registered with the respective departments, with very few exceptions.

We helped hundreds of businesses registered in both Canada and the USA. You have a choice of using a lawyer, an accountant or a business consultant to register your business.

Generally, there are 3 BROAD business structures in Canada and USA. You can choose to register as:
-a sole proprietorship,
-a partnership of two or more people or
-a corporation.
For this article, we are not considering the following organizational structures.
-co-operatives,
-non-profit organizations,
-franchises, public companies…

You may like to discuss the type of business and organization structure with us or one of our professionals before you decide on which of the 3 different business organizations you wish to register.

Some of our associates are professional lawyers and accountants. You decide if you wish to engage them or not. We will be very upfront with the fees during our initial meetings. Our fees may not be the cheapest nor the most expensive. They will be in line with the market trends.

Usually, before you register a business, you get a business name reserved and approved first. It used to take a fair amount of time to register a business, weeks or months in the old days.

Now with the internet, you can reserve a business name and get your business registered in a few days, regardless of whether you are registering a sole proprietorship or corporation.

The time required to register a business in both Canada and the USA normally varies from a few days to about a month. You can request expedited service with an additional fee.

The business registration fees and processes vary from province to province in Canada. They also vary from state to state in the USA as well.

In the Prince Edward Island of Canada, the smallest province, the cost of registering a sole proprietorship is C$90, including the registration and the publication on the Royal Gazette. The name search fee is an additional C$40 for a total of C$130.

In the Province of British Columbia, the cost of reserving three business names is C$30. After one of the requested names was approved and reserved, the cost to register the business name is C$40 for a total of C$70.

In the Province of Ontario, for registering sole proprietorship businesses, the business name search or reservation is optional. The cost of registering a sole proprietorship business is C$60 if you register online, C$80 if you register in person or by mail.

When registering a sole proprietorship business in Ontario, we would recommend doing a thorough name search through various networks, the Ontario Business Registry, Canadian Business Registry Search, and the Government Nuans among other research.

Ontario or any province does not prohibit several non-incorporated and non-registered businesses to have the same business name. It is OK in Canada to use your own name in a sole proprietorship business. For example, John Young in London, Ontario, Canada (not London, UK) could call himself John Young Landscaping. Another person coming to the same London city with the exact same name and doing similar landscaping work could call his business the same name!

Still, it is best to do thorough research to avoid duplicate names and future legal actions. At the very least register your sole proprietorship name with the local province or territory.

We would recommend one of them to register a DBA, doing business as, name. As a sole proprietor or a partnership owner, you can have a few DBA business names in Canada.

A better form of protecting your business name in Canada throughout the whole country is to consider incorporating your business federally. In the USA company incorporation is administered at the state level, not at their federal level. In that case, consider using patents or trademarks on your business names.