Guide 31 · First 90 days
The first 90 days: a foreign founder's checklist after formation
Formation day produces a PDF and a feeling of completion. Both are misleading. The company exists, but it cannot yet be paid, taxed correctly, or kept alive past its first anniversary. The ninety days after filing decide whether the company becomes an operating business or an expensive souvenir — here is the sequence, in order.
On this page
Week one: paper that must be right
Days 1–7. Confirm the filing came back exactly as ordered: legal name character-for-character, entity type, formation state, registered agent of record. Errors are cheapest now — a name misspelt at the state propagates to the EIN application, the bank and every contract. Store the stamped articles and the agent's details in one place; you will produce them at least five times this quarter. Decide, in writing, who the members are and in what proportions, even if the answer is one person at 100% — the operating agreement drafting starts here, not at the bank.
Days 3–21. The EIN. If it was applied for by fax on Form SS-4 — the standard route without an SSN — the confirmation letter (CP 575) arrives by fax or mail on the IRS's timetable, commonly inside the 15–25 business-day window our EIN guide sets out. Guard the CP 575 like a passport; our lost-confirmation guide exists because founders do not.
The operating agreement is a working document
The operating agreement is not a formation extra. Banks ask for it to open accounts, marketplaces ask for it in verification, and a CPA reads it to confirm the ownership the Form 5472 will report. A single-member agreement is short but not empty: capital contributions, management, bank authority, what happens on death or incapacity, and the tax posture the company takes. Our operating agreements guide lists the clauses that actually get read.
Sign it, date it, store it with the articles. An unsigned agreement found in month nine is treated by every reviewer as a document drafted in month nine.
Banking and Stripe: one identity, everywhere
Days 14–45. Open the bank account with the full pack ready before you apply: stamped articles, CP 575, operating agreement, passport, proof of your home address, and a one-paragraph description of what the business does and where its customers are. Fintech banks serving non-residents decide on the file's coherence as much as its contents. Then open Stripe with the identical legal name and EIN — the name/TIN discipline our 1099-K guide explains is set here, at account opening, or paid for later in mismatch notices.
Expect the W-8BEN-E request and identity verification for beneficial owners. Neither is a rejection; both are the standard documentation of a foreign-owned US company, as our banking guide walks through.
Books, calendar and the two dates that matter
- Open the books on day one of trading, not at tax time. A separate ledger for the company, every payout and fee recorded, owner transfers labelled as contributions or draws. Our bookkeeping guide lists the records the 5472 and your CPA actually need.
- Calendar the federal date now: Form 5472 with the pro-forma 1120, due April 15 (with the extension mechanics your CPA advises), penalty starting at $25,000. Our 5472 explainer is the reference.
- Calendar the state date: annual report or franchise tax in your formation state — the date and amount are on your state page, and missing it starts the dissolution clock our reinstatement guide describes.
- Decide your tax help: if the facts in our 1040-NR guide touch you — US staff, premises, inventory — engage the CPA this quarter, while positions are still choices.
The day-90 sweep
Days 45–90. Run the first compliance sweep against the calendar: state filings acknowledged, agent service active, mail arriving and being scanned, the website and US number live if your bundle includes them. Check the registered-agent mail flow with a real piece of mail if one has arrived — the channel you discover is broken in month nine was usually broken in month two.
Then write the one-page operations note future-you will need: where the documents live, which accounts exist, what renews when, and who acts if you are unreachable. Companies owned from abroad fail administratively, not commercially — the note is the cheapest insurance in this entire checklist.
How the bundle maps to this list
Inside a Sethhost membership, the sequence above is the work the bundle is organised around: formation handling and the EIN workflow in the first term, the registered agent already of record, the compliance calendar seeded at checkout with the state date and the 5472 date, and the document shelf holding the pack the bank asks for. The checklist stays the same whether you run it through us or alone — the difference is whose desk each step sits on. The readiness check on this site exists to tally where you stand before you start.
Verification. Checked 2026-11-12 against the sources each step cites on this site: IRS.gov (EIN confirmation and Form 5472 due dates) and the state filing facts published on Sethhost's own state pages, which carry their own verification lines.
Reading is step one. The paperwork is the rest.
Sethhost handles formation paperwork, the EIN workflow, registered agent service, your website, a US number, and a compliance calendar — one company, one bill. Hosted is $79 per month and formation is included in your first term; the state filing fee is always shown separately.