Registering a business in Maryland is four steps handled by four bodies, with a state portal that joins several of them together. The confusion is almost entirely about which office does what.
The four registrations
The entity. Filed with the Department of Assessments and Taxation, Articles of Organization for an LLC, Articles of Incorporation for a corporation. A sole proprietorship files nothing at all, which is the source of a persistent misunderstanding: not registering is a valid choice, not an oversight.
The federal tax number. An EIN from the IRS, free and immediate online. Required for employers and for any entity other than a single-member LLC with no employees, and worth having regardless because banks ask for it.
State tax accounts. Sales and use tax and income tax withholding, opened with the Comptroller of Maryland. Free, and carrying filing obligations from the moment they exist.
Employer registration. With the Division of Unemployment Insurance, before the first payday, covered on the hiring and managing employees page.
Trade names
A trade name is a name other than the entity’s own legal name. Registration is with the Department of Assessments and Taxation, and it is optional in law.
It is not optional in practice, because a bank asked to open an account in a name that is not the entity’s legal name will want to see the registration. Most businesses trading under anything other than their own name therefore register one.
Two things a trade name registration is not. It is not a trademark, it records that you trade under a name in Maryland, and it does not stop anyone else using something similar. And it does not create an entity: a sole proprietor with a registered trade name is still a sole proprietor with unlimited liability, and the forms of business organization page explains why that distinction matters.
The combined portal
Maryland’s business express portal is a front end to several of these offices, allowing entity formation, trade name registration, annual reports and links into the tax registrations from one place. It removes a good deal of duplicated data entry.
What it does not do is remove the underlying separation. Filings still land at the office responsible for them, questions still have to go to that office, and a problem with a tax account is not solved by the entity registration being correct.
The resident agent
Every Maryland entity must have a resident agent: a person or company at a Maryland street address who accepts legal documents on its behalf. An owner can serve, and many do.
The consequence to understand is that the address becomes part of a public, searchable record. Anyone using a home address is publishing it. Commercial registered agent services exist for exactly this reason and cost modestly per year.
Order and timing
Form the entity first, because everything else attaches to it. EIN next, which is immediate. Then the tax accounts, then the employer registration if there will be staff.
Registering in the wrong order is recoverable but wasteful: tax accounts opened in a sole proprietor’s name before an LLC is formed have to be reopened, and licenses issued to the wrong legal person have to be reissued.
Choosing a name
The order that avoids wasted money.
Check the entity register for a conflicting registered name. Free, immediate.
Check trademarks, at least at federal level. A name that clears the state register can still infringe a mark, and state registration is no defense.
Check the domain and the handles before committing, since a name with no usable web presence creates a lasting problem.
Then register. Signage, stationery and packaging come last, after the name is secured rather than before.
The sequence matters because each check is free and the rework is not.
What registration does not give you
It is not a license to trade. Registration creates the entity; whether the business may operate at an address, in a trade, is answered by the city and by the trade licensing described on the licenses and permits page.
It is not a trademark. Registering a trade name in Maryland does not stop anyone else using something similar, in Maryland or anywhere else.
It does not open a bank account. That requires the formation documents, the EIN, identification and usually the trade name registration, and each bank has its own list.
It does not create limited liability by itself. The entity must also be maintained separately — its own account, its own records, no personal spending running through it — as the forms of business organization page sets out.
After registration, in the first month
Open the business bank account. Set up bookkeeping before there are transactions to enter. Diary the annual report date. Confirm which tax accounts the business actually needs and register only those, since an account opened unnecessarily carries a filing obligation forever.
That last point is worth emphasizing. A sales and use tax account opened by a business that sells nothing taxable produces returns to file for no reason, and closing it later is more work than not opening it.