How much does it cost to maintain a business license? How to register and maintain a company at low cost?

》Minimum Operating Cost Should Be 760/year

Scope of Business (Reference):

Business Scope: General items: technology services, technology development, technology consulting, technology exchange, technology transfer, technology promotion; production, sales, processing, transportation, storage, and other related services for agricultural products; legal consulting (excluding business requiring a law firm's practice license); retail of jewelry and precious stones; matchmaking services; sales of arts and crafts and ceremonial supplies (excluding ivory and its products); sale of Class I medical devices; sale of Class II medical devices: wholesale of cosmetics; retail of cosmetics; wholesale of clothing and apparel; retail of clothing and apparel; engineering management services; software outsourcing services; software sales; software development for network and information security; sales of electronic products; urbanized management; sales of household appliances; socio-economic consulting services; advertising production; internet data services. (Except for items subject to approval according to law, business activities may be carried out independently with the business license according to law.) Licensed items: catering services (projects subject to approval according to law may only be carried out after approval by relevant departments. Specific business items are subject to approval documents or license certificates issued by relevant departments).

Main operations may revolve around:

Internet advertising, advertisements, matchmaking introductions, paid content communities, websites, etc.

Initial One-Time Costs:

Here, what involves business compliance:

The ICP License and Value-Added Telecommunications Business License (EDI) are qualifications required for websites offering paid content. Although you can conduct business under the business scope after obtaining an ICP filing for your website, for full compliance, both the ICP License and EDI License are mandatory (as a form of qualification insurance). However, the prerequisites for these are troublesome (for me, at least): the company's registered capital must be no less than 1 million RMB, and the company must have at least 3 employees with social security contributions paid continuously for no less than 3 months (preferably 4 months, given the time needed to process the certificates). The registered capital must also be fully paid within 5 years.

Next:

It is advisable to avoid including items in the business scope that require specific operational qualifications. Otherwise, you may face obstacles when filing with other departments (e.g., website filing). For example, when filing a website for business purposes, because the business scope included sale of Class I medical devices; sale of Class II medical devices, we were required to provide the corresponding business operation license. (According to the tax/accounting firm, this certificate is quite expensive, and a residential address cannot be used as the registered address for obtaining it.) Therefore, if not necessary, it is best to avoid selecting such items in the business scope.

Other Required Business Expenses:

From this perspective, the conservative annual basic operating cost is: 6900 RMB/year.

Notes Based on Personal Experience and Understanding:

For a limited liability company's registered address, if there are no other issues affecting qualification applications, it is recommended to use a residential address as the registered address. This can save some costs associated with using a commercial registered address.

Regarding the shareholding structure of a limited liability company, it is recommended that parents and children hold shares in each other (even if it's 99% and 1%). This setup leverages the limited liability attribute, meaning compensation and liability are generally capped at the limit of the company's liabilities (administrative penalties aside). However, if spouses hold shares in each other, it is still treated as unlimited liability for accountability purposes.

If your business involves other parties settling in to operate and sell, you need to possess the corresponding qualifications yourself (some platforms also require ICP and EDI licenses for matchmaking businesses). Additionally, you must hold an ICP License and a Value-Added Telecommunications Business License (EDI). All operation licenses can be applied for by yourself (for free). The role of tax/accounting intermediaries is mainly to run errands and assist in communicating and resolving issues when certain conditions are not met. However, the prerequisite requirements are unavoidable: [1 million RMB registered capital + social security contributions for at least 3 people continuously for 4 months].

When registering the capital, it needs to be paid in full within 5 years. If you haven't considered paying it in and just want to use the enterprise qualification, theoretically, you can register with the minimum amount (around 2016, it could be as low as 1 RMB; now it's unclear, but probably 1000 or 10000 RMB). Also, even without a company seal, corporate banks can currently verify and allow the use of Enterprise WeChat directly (this loophole will likely be closed later). However, this doesn't apply to official accounts, mini-programs, or video accounts, which all require verification via corporate bank transfers. Perhaps this is why many companies find migrating their accounts difficult due to the inability to meet the paid-in capital requirement within 5 years.

If you want to find a reliable tax/accounting intermediary company, the best approach is to visit the local Administration for Market Regulation (formerly the Industry and Commerce Bureau) and ask the staff for recommendations. Cooperating with such agencies can save you a lot of hassle (for example, situations requiring the legal representative or shareholders to appear and sign for company seals or corporate bank account openings; these agencies can usually handle them for you without your presence). In the first couple of years, you can use their services to handle qualification matters, and later consider switching providers or handling it yourself to significantly reduce costs. If you don't want to use an accounting agency's bookkeeping service, you can consider doing the bookkeeping yourself, bringing the cost down to under 1000 RMB.

Overall, just maintaining a business license requires a considerable minimum investment.