Every registered business organization in Texas is required to have both a registered agent and a registered office. Both of these must be kept updated with the Secretary of State. Failure to keep this information up to date can lead to your company getting sued without you ever knowing it, leaving you with no opportunity to answer the lawsuit, which in turn leads to default judgments against your company.

Registered Agent

The person designated by the business organization to receive official state correspondence and notice if the corporation is served with a lawsuit. The registered agent in Texas must have a business office identical to the registered office and must be either: (1) an individual residing in the state, or (2) a business entity with authority to transact business in the state.

Registered Office

Every registered Texas business organization must maintain a registered office located in the state. The registered office: (1) must be located at an actual street address (no P.O. Boxes) where process may be personally served on the entity’s registered agent; (2) is not required to be a place of business of the filing entity or foreign filing entity, but often is; and (3) may not be solely a mailbox service or a telephone answering service.

Registered Agent Services

Many companies, corporations, and lawyers will act as your registered agent for a yearly or monthly fee. The main benefit of using a registered agent service is that your business will not need to worry about keeping this information updated with the Texas Secretary of State. If the registered agent service changes locations they will be the one required to update the records. Otherwise, if either your registered agent or registered office changes, then you will be responsible for filing the required update with the Secretary of State and paying the filing fees (presently $15 for changing the registered address and $15 for changing the registered agent. If you do not presently have a location where someone can be reliably found during normal business hours I suggest that you look into using a registered agent service. We offer this service for free to anyone who uses our incorporation services.