How to Change Your Utah Business Name

How to Get a New Business Name

All it takes to change your business name in Utah is to file an amendment with the Utah Secretary of State’s office. By following these steps, you can make sure that you’re not missing anything and it’s done correctly. 

1) Choose a new business name

The first obvious step is to pick the best new name for your business, which may not be as simple as you might think. There are many reasons why your company might need a new name. You might have had changes in ownership that have created a need for a new name. Or you might be changing the types of products you’re selling. Maybe you’re moving the business to a new town. The good news is that there are only a few rules that you need to follow when choosing a new name:  

• Your new name has to be unique in Utah and can’t be used by any other business
• The business name has to use the business structure abbreviation, such as Inc. or LLC

Utah has some additional naming restrictions. For example, you can’t have a name that suggests your company is an agency of the state or that your company is organized for any other purpose than what is stated in its articles of incorporation or organization. The Utah Department of Commerce has an extensive list of naming restrictions, requirements, and conventions, including a list of prohibited words, online. 

Our Business Name Checker service allows you to easily check to see if your new name is available.

2) Gather information for filing your amendment

In Utah, there is certain information that you’ll need to gather before you begin the process of changing your business name. Here is a brief list of the information you need to complete the process:

• The new name of the company
• Your company’s registered agent and contact information
• The state entity ID
• The access ID to the state website for filing
• Any other changes you would like to make to the formation documents

A lot of this information will be with your business documents, so be sure to keep those in a place you’ll remember.

3) File your Utah Amendment

You can file the amendment online or by mail. If you have an LLC, you’ll be amending your Articles of Organization, and if you have a corporation, you’ll amend its Articles of Incorporation. Your name change will be effective on the next business day after filing. There’s a small filing fee for every amendment.

After You Change Your Business Name

Once your company’s name is officially changed, there will be some things to put on your to-do list:

• All legal documents that have the old name should be changed
• All currently used marketing materials should be removed from service and adjusted to the new name as soon as possible
• Review your business start-up papers to determine if any other documents need updating with the new name
• Don’t forget to check your social media and online presence to see if these vital means of communication with your customers need to be updated. 

Taking the time to address these little things will help avoid confusion and potential problems as you move forward with your new name.

We can help

Our goal is for you to spend more time making your company a success and less time on research and filing paperwork with the state. We hope that this article helps you with how to change a business name in Utah. 

If you’re concerned about keeping track of all the required documents you need to file with the state, consider using our Worry-Free Compliance Service to help ease the burden. You have enough on your plate already, so let us take care of some of the grunt work.

And if you haven’t gotten to the point of forming your business entity yet because you’re just starting, we can help with that as well. Our business formation services will walk you through what it takes to create a Utah LLC or start a Utah corporation.