Forming an Ontario Corporation: Filing Articles of Incorporation Online through Cyberbahn



My First Ontario Corporation!


In Ontario, there are two approved vendors that handle them online. You can fill them out by hand (or a fillable PDF form), but then you have to pay more. Finally, the government gives you a discount for saving their time. I can't stand how you always have to pay extra to pay a ticket online rather than snail mail. Shouldn't it be the other way around?

So, I chose amongst the two vendors. I couldn't find any reviews online, so let this be one.

The two approved vendors are:
Cyberbahn - CAD$355 for an Ontario numbered corporation (plus GST on the $55 portion)
Oncorp - CAD$400 all in for an Ontario numbered corporation
I had thought there were three, but it appears that there are now two. Please leave a comment if you know of others that directly deal with the government. The third is ESC Corp. I have no experience with them, but they have the least worst name out of the three and they left a comment here recognizing how much I think Cyberbahn sucks, so ESC gets points in my book.

Anyone else just takes sends the forms to them for some extra cash. They may or may not provide extra value for these extra expenses. Filling out the forms themselves is rather simple, but what to put in them will depend on your own situation.  I used some of the information on this site to help me out: https://www.incorporationontario.ca/fontbnumber.html, but the information on it may not be good for you, you'll have to find/pay for your own advice from a competent advisor.

There are plenty of lawyers, paralegals and others that will do the paperwork for you. Whether you require this or not is a decision for you to make, and not one I'm making for you here.

If you ever want to change your Articles of Incorporation, it'll cost ya $150 for an Ontario corporation.

I decided to do a numbered corporation since I don't feel the need for anything fancy, and don't need to get sued for having a similar name to someone else. If I need to, I can later register a "Trade Name" for the business and do the whole NUANS search thing.

My experience with Cyberbahn for a Numbered Ontario Corporation:

  • Don't expect any handholding regarding what to put in for your Articles, that's legal advice and you won't get that from them, nor should you expect it.
  • They're owned by Thomson-Reuters, which I only learned of after the fact.
  • Their name sucks
  • They make you pay up-front, not after you get to look at or complete the forms. This is a red flag. Not that they're going to scam you out of the money, it just made me wonder how much their online systems were going to suck. The answer: a lot.
  • The step-by-step process isn't that bad, just remember: They don't save your work after each step. I think you just have to do it all at once. It saves it before you finally submit it though, so you can then leave the process and re-continue later. Perhaps you can click "Save to Database" in the middle of the process, but I'm not sure.
  • When you Save to Database, and then login later, good luck finding your form to continue again. I thought it had just lost it all, and finally managed to find the forms to fill it out. After filling it all out again, before submitting it, it asked for my credit card information again. Wait a minute, didn't I already pre-pay?
  • It turns out that to continue your form, you have to click on this bone-headed button called "Entrepreneur", and then find your online form under the "To Do" menu. Ugh, seriously?
  • Feel free to call their 1-800 number, they answered right away and were able to walk me through how to continue my previously paid for form. I asked, and they said that they were working on re-designing it, I sure hope so.
  • It does get the job done (or at least it seems to have so far)
A Federal corporation only costs $200, and $20/year for the annual return. This might be a better deal if you think your corporation might not last long ;) I've heard that outside of Ontario, even if you file for a federal corporation, you'll still have to register it provincially and pay up. I'm in Ontario, so I don't know, but something for you to research if you're considering a provincial corporation outside Ontario.

After Incorporating: What Next?

Next up: Getting a corporate bank account (on the cheap)
Good reading: Review of 800 Toll Free Number Provider (on the cheap!)

profit sharing in Incorporation

Hi,
I have a question regarding Incorporation as far as investment and profit sharing is concerned.
I would really appreciate your time to clarify .

Two partners( called John and David) want start a company (J&D Inc.) which manufactures Pumps and Motors.

John is expert in Pumps. So, he wanted to make all the investement needed to make the pumps and take all the revenue generated out of Pumps.

Similarly, David is expert in Motors . So, he too wanted to make all the investement needed to make the Motors and take all the revenue generated out of Motors.

They wanted to share the lease/rent, office supplies, compuetrs equally. Basially they will do two independent businesses under one name.

Is it possible in Incorporation? How do I divide based on the produt groups?

Thanks
Prabhakar

We are the 3rd approved vendor and BEST online service provider

Your article was quite funny and obviously I derived a great deal of enjoyment in the fact that you found almost evertything about Cyberbahn and your experience with their service and website to be one that overall basically "SUCKED".
However, we, ESC Corporate Services Ltd. formerly Dye & Durham Business and Registration Division are in fact the third service providers you eluded to. (www.eservicecorp.ca)
You can file, register, search, pre search and do any of the required searches and/or filings that you refer to as available from our competitors, Cyberbahn and OnCorp. You can use ESC for online direct access or staff assisted as well.
As you might assume we believe that we are better than anyone else and obviously would assert that your end user experience would not in fact suck. However that is not the point, I just take exception to the fact that we are not mentioned in the mix as far as being an approved vendor. Thanks for the laugh

ESC Corporation.

Fixed. You owe me a free incorporation (I like, might seriously need another one soon).

First Incorporation In Ontario

Dan,

Thank you for very helpful tips on incorporating in Ontario. The information provided is exactly what I was looking for. I will be saving at least $500 after reading your tips.

Thanks,
Annoymous

So how much would it cost to

So how much would it cost to do it in person as opposed to these two online solutions?

The difference is like $40,

The difference is like $40, which is ridiculous, why should it cost MORE to do something online when you do half of the work for them? It reminds me of the "convenience fee" for paying parking tickets online. Uhhhhh, how much does it cost to process a payment in person vs. online?

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