Certificates of Amendment

Oftentimes, there is a point during the life of a business when the information included in company's articles of incorporation or articles of organization needs to be altered, for example to change the company's name, to expand or alter the company's business purpose, or to change the number of authorized shares or par value (for corporations only). To do this, a certificate of amendment must be filed with the state, and the appropriate state fees be paid.

A certificate of amendment is a document filed with your state of formation, or if applicable with any states in which your company has foreign qualified to transact business, to enact a specific change to the information included in your company's formation or qualification documents.  

States recognize that certain information, such as director (corporations) or member/manager (LLCs) information can change often, and therefore allow updates by means of the corporation's or LLC's annual report. However, for the majority of the information included in the formation documents, a certificate of amendment is necessary.

Types of Amendments

• Name Amendments are used when a company chooses to change its name.  
• Purpose Amendments are used when the focus of your company or organization's business has changed, and you have a detailed business purpose clause in your formation documents that consequently needs to be updated.
• Share Amendments are used when a corporation alters the number of authorized shares and/or par value outlined in its articles of incorporation. Common causes for this include seeking venture capital or additional investors.

Even if you didn't place your original formation order with BizFilings, we can prepare and file the necessary documentation for your business in any state for name, purpose and share amendments.