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Firstbase Agent — Ditch the lawyers, save hours on your compliance filings
Save time on state filings, federal tax support, foreign qualification, payroll tax registration, and more — all from our comprehensive compliance solution. Let us handle the fine print so you can focus on growing your brand.
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Love it! As a business model geek, I'm so impressed with your product/gtm strategy. Moving into compliance for remote teams is such an epic new chapter for y'all. Excited to use you guys as we build out a remote team.
@stedmanblake thanks for the kind words and super excited to have you as a customer. I wish you success in building your remote team - we are also a remote company and we know that is challenging!
Congrats on the launch guys! This will be super helpful for founders from the UK and those around the world!
@musleh_khan we already incorporated a few thousands of companies from UK! Thanks for your feedback and support today.
The comments here seem like they are upvoting with no evidence of using the product. Is this what PH has become?
My experience with FirstBase Agent was a disaster and Im surprised that they are launching it on Product Hunt.
I had paid for Change of agent service to Firstbase on November 6, 2022. Till date we have not received the service and repeated requests for a timeline are not answered. In January, one of their support staff responded saying they were very backlogged and recommended proceeding with a refund rather than moving forward with them. Finally in February I decided to call it quits and took the refund and cancelled my Agent subscription with Firstbase
Firstbase has caused numerous business process interruptions by not having a Registered Agent for 3 months and I regret having ever considered your services.
Congrats on your launch on Product Hunt! 🎉 This looks like a great tool and I'm excited to see how it makes business compliance easier. Could you tell me a bit more about how it helps with foreign qualification specifically? Looking forward to learning more about this amazing product! 🤩
@paolo_degiglio Hi Paolo - once you purchase Autopilot, we help with you sign up for foreign qualification. Within our app, you have the option to select for which states you would like to foreign qualify with. All you need to do is is pay the state fees after selecting and we take care of the rest!
@paolo_degiglio thanks for your feedback! We are super excited with Agent as well.
Talking about foreign qualification, we offer that at no interest rate for all 50 states (you only need to cover the state fees).
The process is super simple and you can expand to any state in a few minutes:
1 - Go to agent onboarding: https://onboarding.firstbase.io/...
2 - Select you want to expand to a new state
3 - Choose your Agent plan (highly recommend Autopilot!)
4 - You will have access to our Agent dashboard where you can manage every compliance task with the state and our team will notify and handle everything on your behalf!
You are more than welcome to test our product and count on me if you need any assistance!
8 months ago, I did not have a great experience with Firstbase. I signed up and a couple odd things happened:
- Radio silence from them when I responded to their onboarding email. Just nothing. If they're not responding to their own onboarding emails, how can I trust they'll reliably handle state compliance filings?
- They started sending out 3rd party advertising emails from a company called SafeOpt...which they seemingly outsourced their drip emails too? It was bizarre.
It's such a nicely designed site in market that doesn't have great options. I really wish they were as good as they looked.
@scott_ames_messinger My experience with them has been similar, they have not executed on my change of agent request for 3 months and given the excuse of too much workload. I am surprised that they are launching their service on PH now
@scott_ames_messinger Almost all of the upvotes and positive comments seem to be by people who have not actually used the service
@neiljlobo So weird! I wonder if there's some gaming going on. I kinda thought the company was a ghost company that barely existed -- it was such an odd experience. Being sent 3rd party ads after onboarding blew my mind.
And I agree -- I was also surprised to see them launch! And, perhaps I shouldn't be surprised, but I figured if they had launched on PH, they would probably see my post, find the old email, form an apology, and I might consider trying them out again. But, alas.
It's a space that needs more competition. I wish they were rising to the occasion.
@scott_ames_messinger @neiljlobo damn, guys, this sounds rough. I want to open a company in the US and Firstbase is on my top list next to Stripe Atlas and Clerky. What are your recommendations, guys?
@neiljlobo @alaverdyan I wouldn't. Here's how another company handled something similiarly: A company I was using (Stable) was unresponsive and I mentioned it on ProductHunt. When they saw the comment, they apologized profusely, found the email, identified why it happened, and apologized again. All my future interactions were positive -- it was clear my experience was an outlier and they felt bad and embarrassed and fixed it. I'd work with Stable if we needed their services.
Take Firstbase. Neil & I have similar experiences (non responsiveness) and what does the VP of **OPS** do? In a comment now deleted, he writes, "I'm definitely open to chatting to understand feedback and how we can be better." That's a non-answer. It's clear what they can do better (be responsive) and the course of action is obvious (reach out to us proactively and resolve this). It wasn't a serious response. It's the response of a company where this probably happens a lot.
So, I'd use anything other than Firstbase. I was hoping my comment on PH would lead me to like and trust them more...but the opposite has happened.
I haven't used Atlas or Clerky, but we've used CorpNet in the past and they're very, very fast with registrations. I don't love them, but they're very competent at the filing part.
Hi everyone, VP of Operations here at Firstbase.io! We're super excited to launch Agent to help the next generation of startups. With Agent you save massive amounts of time and 💰 - let us deal with the pain of filing while you do what you do best
Hy everyone! Congratulations on the launch of the Firstbase Agent on the PH! 🎉
Looks like a serious project.
Our company was incorporated in the US via Clerky. They provide similar services.
Tell me, please, how are you different from them?
What is your killer feature?
@denis_galka hi VP of Ops at Firstbase. Firstbase is trying to become the all in one business OS. Our killer thesis is that we will help you organize all of your back office tools and data into one easy to use place! Imagine having all of your incorporation documents, legal compliance reminders, being able to do most business filings while also signing up for different tools like Carta or Mercury in one platform
Hey, @denis_galka ! Nice to hear from you and thanks for your question.
Clerky is a great market partner and I am pretty sure everything went smoothie for you. I am obviously biased once I am also the one building Firstbase Start (our incorporation product: https://www.firstbase.io/start, but below I've shared a few killer features (hard to choose one, our team is doing a great job!):
1 - Bank account without EIN: for foreign founders, the EIN process can take a couple of weeks but, with Firstbase, you don't need to wait to have access to your business bank account!
2 - Cap table: Our integration with Carta allows you to create a cap table with just one click after incorporation. We will prepare your legal documents, file your paperwork, and complete all the essential post-incorporation documents.
3 - Rewards: More than any other platform. Our founders have access to more than 250k USD in perks and services that are essential to their businesses;
4 - Building an ecosystem: Our community has earlier access to all products we are launching and everything is smoothie once they are all interconnected. Take a look at how many products we launched last year: https://www.firstbase.io/blog/20...
Much more coming in 2023 - I wish I could share some spoilers, but stay tuned!!
If you're looking for a compliance solution that can help you with everything from state filings to payroll tax registration, we can help. Let us handle the fine print so you can focus on growing your brand.
No COO needed. This makes it easier than ever for founders and nimble teams to stay compliant across the US!
Agent is a game changer! Not having to worry about taxes and compliance is the dream 🙌🏼
Congrats with the launch, Firstbase! 🎉
Currently, I’m looking into opening a company in the US to solve my issues with payments, taxes, invoices, and so on — Firstbase is one of the top choices I have on a list next to Stripe Atlas and Clerky.
I really like your all-in-one approach, and that most of the stuff can be done digitally — and your company seems to cater towards a global audience rather than US residents/citizens specifically 🌐
I have a few questions regarding Firstbase Agent and Firstbase Start — hope you can help me (and maybe other folks too) clarify some things:
1. Is Firstbase Agent included in Firstbase Start? If not, does it make sense to pay for it right away after incorporating the company? Or it is not necessary until some time passes?
2. Is Firstbase Mailroom included in Firstbase Agent? The wording on the Agent page made me think so.
3. “Annual report and franchise tax filings (additional filing fees per state apply)” — this is available only on Autopilot and Payroll plans, but how does it work on a Light plan or if I just incorporate a company with Firstbase Start? Any tax filings are new to me, so I’m not sure where I need to download a form, where should I send it, and so on. Also, do I understand it right, that Franchise Tax is not included on Autopilot and Payroll plans, so I need to pay for them myself?
4. What if I want to hire a non-US resident/citizen? Does “Foreign Qualifications” cover this, or it’s only for US folks from other than incorporation state? Is it even difficult to hire such a person if I start a company with Firstbase Start?
A few questions about Firstbase Start specifically:
6. Most important question: what taxes should I pay as a non-US resident/citizen and all my B2C/B2B clients are not from the US if I open an LLC/C-Corp in Delaware/Wyoming? What if the B2C/B2B clients are in the US? I’m curious specifically about B2B ones, since my initial product is for them. Hope you can clarify this moment, since it’s the most crucial to me — one of startup founders (from Russia, but lives in Montenegro) I know, opened a company in the US in Delaware via Clerky, and he says that he needs to pay only a Franchise Tax (didn’t ask him if his clients are based in the US).
5. I’m building a productized service (unlimited web design/development subscription) which I’m trying to automate as much as possible. This is not a full-blown startup per se I think (most people think about startups as apps, software stuff, etc), but I’m gonna sell digital goods and build various products (one is in idea polish stage) — am I a good fit for Firstbase? I do consider my productized service as a small startup, but not looking for investments and stuff like that right away — it’s more a bootstrapper approach on the start.
7. Considering the previous point, what’s the best state to incorporate a company in: Delaware or Wyoming? Do you have a blog post highlighting the differences between the two?
8. I did hear that LLC is somewhat easier to manage for small startups or/and when there’s only one founder/employee. However, C-Corp overall is easier and less complicated since managing LLCs might be a hassle and changing name/adding new employees/etc is a chore. Can you please clarify this moment? Are C-Corps more expensive to run? I’m not exactly sure what to choose in my situation.
9. Is it complicated to close a company in case if I want to do it with Firstbase Start? What are the fees for doing so?
10. Last, but not least: are there any immigration issues that can be caused by having a company in the US? What if I decide to move to the US? Or what if I want to travel to the US, but also do some work? Will it be considered as that I’m working in the US (and my company is registered in the country too)?
My apologies for this extensive questions list, but I hope you don’t mind answering at least a few of them — I really want to use your services (digital only, yahoo!) as a non-US resident/citizen, but do not understand these important details quite yet.
Thanks for your reply in advance!
P.S: Love the fact that you are using Webflow for your site — as a fellow Webflower, that’s really nice to see, haha 😅
@huntert_pendergrasseh thanks for the feedback and great to hear you are using it!
I really want to support this. I am a customer of Firstbase and have onboarded 5 companies there (and they have paperwork for 7 of my businesses). But there are a ton of issues with the platform, and I have asked so many times as a heavy user to speak to Mark, the CEO, and even reached out personally in the earlier days, and was ignored. I worked in marketing; isn't the best feedback the kind that comes from actual users? I have so much to share about the platform and feel like I'm unimportant despite having paid thousands. I'm sorry it's coming to a public ProductHunt post to possibly get his attention.
Firstbase Agent Intro