Steps involved in opening a business savings or checking account

The first step involved in opening an account for your business is to obviously have a business. 

Banks will definitely not allow you to start a business savings or checking account if you do not own a business. But owning a business does not mean that you need to have loads of cash or have a huge enterprise with thousands of employees on your payroll. You can qualify for a business account if you have something as simple as an e-bay store or even an internet business. You will need to show proof of ownership of the said business. You will need a copy of the articles of incorporation or an LLC to show that you really own a business. You could also show a certificate of existence, charter, certificate of formation, non profit paperwork, trade name registration or any other relevant paper work. Each bank will have a different set of needs.

You will also need an employee identification number or EIN.

An EIN is a number given out to businesses for the purpose of tax identification. It’s something like a social security number. These are numbers that are issued for free by the internal revenue service. The only necessity for this is that you own a business and have sufficient income to file tax returns.

The next step is to actually open an account with a bank.

The initial step is to search for a branch that offers a business savings account or checking account. There are different requirements for different banks but you will need to put in some effort and shop around to find the right one for you. Each account might have a minimum balance requirement or other annual fees. Be sure to search for the right type of terms and conditions which will suit your requirements.

Open a checking account along with your savings account

Always open a business checking account along with your savings account. Even if you do not think that you will write checks, it pays to have it handy. You can also have a credit card attached to the business checking account. And with this credit card you can track all the transactions that your employees have made. This is a very convenient way to handle bills that come through to your business account without any misunderstanding. And you can also easily pay all the dues without having to individually hand out money to each and every employee. This is a very handy convenience to have if you are handling a number of bills and a number of employees are on your pay roll.

Each bank will have its own requirements when you go about trying to open an account. You will have to call or visit each branch to understand what their individual requirements are. And when you call the customer service, you will realize what they really are like. You can talk to them and try and understand whether you are really comfortable with their service. A lot of banks will outsource their customer service to call centres in other countries. Now this is not a problem per se, but in any case it’s always better to check whether the bank is really worth it or not.