All businesses selling products or services that pay any kind of taxes and/or have employees must have a federal tax ID number (also known as an employer identification number or EIN). This is a number assigned solely to your business by the IRS and is used to identify your business to several federal agencies responsible for the regulation of business. If you plan on buying from wholesalers and/or importing merchandise, you will need to have a tax ID number before they will deal with you.
To set up a federal tax ID, contact your nearest Local IRS Field Office, or call the IRS Business and Specialty Tax Hotline at (800)-829-4933
The form you'll need to fill out is IRS From SS-4 and you can download it directly from the SBA Web site.
If your business does not have employees, the IRS recommends you label the top of the form SS-4 "For Identification Purposes Only."
Hi dannyrevs,
From what I gathered, EIN may not be required but most small business advisors, and as you say the Michigan Treasury website, recommend that you apply for an EIN, (also called FEIN if it is a Federal Tax Id Number ) and use that number instead of the Social Security Number.
A Federal Tax Id Number is required for employers and corporations as well as partnerships, though sole proprietors may also get it.
If you google online there are a lot of services offering to get this number for you, do not fill out their forms, because there are also a lot of unsafe phishing sites. It will be smart to go directly to the IRS -
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In the IRS website, getting EIN online doesn't seem to be a daunting task.
It says "No need to file a Form SS-4. We ask you the questions and you give us the answers. After all validations are done you will get your EIN immediately upon completion. You can then download, save, and print your EIN confirmation notice."
Hope I got them right. :)
Kind regards,
I was confused by a few questions though. One asked when my tax year ended. Since it just rolled Aug i put July for the answer?