Today TaxMama® hears from Andrea in the TaxQuips Forum who needs help. “My husband and I are trying to set up a turnkey small business and need a virtual terminal to run credit card information. Because of our bad credit history we are being rejected with our current SSNs. Do you think if we were to form a general partnership and get a tax ID# for the general partnership we might have better luck?”
Hi Andrea,
That’s a good question. And I don’t know the answer. Why?
Because even if you give them a GP’s or a corporation’s employer ID #, they are still going to ask for yours as well.
I know that the folks selling corporations and LLCs all say that if you incorporate, you can improve your credit. It may be true…in some personal fashion. But when it comes to allowing you to accept credit cards? The banks are wary. They stand to lose a lot of money.
Have you tried to open up a PayPal account to use them to have your clients/customers pay you? Perhaps you can do that for a year or so. Open up a personal PayPal account. Establish a history with them. Then open up a merchant account with PayPal.
It doesn’t cost anything for the personal account. You only pay the fees directly related to your transactions.
And remember, you can find answers to all kinds of questions about getting paid online and other tax and business issues, free. Where? Where else? At www.TaxMama.com.
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