<story><title>We got our first Delaware tax bill: $74,018.74</title><text>We are Imaginary Number, a small educational games startup with 3 founders, zero employees, and a handful of paying customers. I finally opened the letter from CSC, the Delaware agent responsible for collecting taxes. Here&amp;#x27;s what they sent:&lt;p&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;mathbreakers.com&amp;#x2F;static&amp;#x2F;img&amp;#x2F;csc_delaware_tax.jpg&lt;p&gt;After 10 minutes of mounting panic, I came across some information which relieved me. Apparently Delaware likes to use the maximum method for calculating taxes for startups, when we actually only owe a tiny fraction of the amount they claim we owe (and they offer a hefty interest of $525.56 on this supposed balance as well!)&lt;p&gt;Here&amp;#x27;s the article, if you&amp;#x27;re a C-Corp in Delaware and at the seed stage, you&amp;#x27;ll need to see this.
http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;capgenius.com&amp;#x2F;2011&amp;#x2F;03&amp;#x2F;02&amp;#x2F;de-franchise-tax&amp;#x2F;&lt;p&gt;Any other startups here gotten a nice &amp;quot;tax surprise&amp;quot;? Would love to hear about it!</text></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>chao-</author><text>Quite the opposite. In Texas, until a certain point in revenue, they really don&amp;#x27;t want to waste any time and resources on you. They ask &amp;quot;Did you make at least $1,000,000 last year? No? Well, please move along peasant, we have &lt;i&gt;real businesses&lt;/i&gt; to deal with who might actually be worth auditing.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;Makes sense, somewhat. Even in the case of minor fraud, they would likely spend more in manpower than they could possibly reclaim from such a low-earning outfit. You still have to file, of course, but it&amp;#x27;s properly simple if you didn&amp;#x27;t earn a significant amount.&lt;p&gt;&lt;i&gt;EDIT: corrected from $200,000 to one million.&lt;/i&gt;</text></comment>
<story><title>We got our first Delaware tax bill: $74,018.74</title><text>We are Imaginary Number, a small educational games startup with 3 founders, zero employees, and a handful of paying customers. I finally opened the letter from CSC, the Delaware agent responsible for collecting taxes. Here&amp;#x27;s what they sent:&lt;p&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;mathbreakers.com&amp;#x2F;static&amp;#x2F;img&amp;#x2F;csc_delaware_tax.jpg&lt;p&gt;After 10 minutes of mounting panic, I came across some information which relieved me. Apparently Delaware likes to use the maximum method for calculating taxes for startups, when we actually only owe a tiny fraction of the amount they claim we owe (and they offer a hefty interest of $525.56 on this supposed balance as well!)&lt;p&gt;Here&amp;#x27;s the article, if you&amp;#x27;re a C-Corp in Delaware and at the seed stage, you&amp;#x27;ll need to see this.
http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;capgenius.com&amp;#x2F;2011&amp;#x2F;03&amp;#x2F;02&amp;#x2F;de-franchise-tax&amp;#x2F;&lt;p&gt;Any other startups here gotten a nice &amp;quot;tax surprise&amp;quot;? Would love to hear about it!</text></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>miiiiiike</author><text>It&amp;#x27;s a good idea to run your numbers through the Franchise Tax Calculator:  &lt;a href=&quot;http://corp.delaware.gov/taxcalc.shtml&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;corp.delaware.gov&amp;#x2F;taxcalc.shtml&lt;/a&gt;  Mine was $180k on the statement, ~$1.7k in reality.&lt;p&gt;Still, even though I knew exactly how much I owed, when I saw $180k on the statement my first call was to my lawyer, for a hug.</text></comment>