The single longest delay in the formation pipeline for non-US founders has historically not been the LLC filing, the bank application, or the Stripe setup. It’s been the EIN. For a long time, the IRS standard for foreign applicants without an SSN was 4–8 weeks by fax — and from China, India, or Southeast Asia, where most of our early customers come from, that wait often stretched longer. Bank applications stalled. Stripe sign-ups paused. Founders sat for a month with a registered LLC they couldn’t actually use.
That’s what same-day EIN at Mizu is built to fix. Here’s what it actually is, how it works, and what’s now bundled into our compliance plan alongside it.
What “same-day EIN” actually means
The IRS has phone and fax handling paths for certain international EIN applications that most founders don’t know about. An authorized third-party designee can help work that path on behalf of the LLC. When the documentation is in order and the IRS agent is able to process the case, the EIN may be issued during that process.
That’s the mechanism. We prepare Form SS-4 with you listed as the responsible party and Mizu as the authorized third-party designee, then work the fastest IRS path available during US business hours. In a clean case, the EIN can be released during the interaction, with written confirmation following through the IRS’s normal documentation channels. In our experience, the full path from active handling to EIN in hand is often much faster than the standard fax queue.
The honest caveat
This depends on IRS conditions on the day. If the international line has a long queue, if the agent flags a documentation question, or if there’s a backend issue, the process can take longer or require a follow-up. We don’t promise an exact hour because the IRS doesn’t promise us one. What we do promise is that we work the fastest path the IRS provides, and in our experience clean cases are often resolved same-day or next-day for foreign-owned single-member LLCs with clean SS-4 paperwork.
Why it’s a $99 add-on, not the default
Two reasons.
First, not every founder needs it. If you’re forming an LLC and you’re not in a rush — your bank application is a few weeks out, your product isn’t live yet, you’re not paying for ads that need a Stripe account — the standard IRS fax path is free, and waiting a few weeks is fine. We don’t want to charge people for speed they don’t need.
Second, the same-day path takes real operator time on our end: preparing the SS-4 with the right details for international applicants, confirming the responsible party documentation, placing and managing the IRS call, handling any clarifying questions live. Pricing it as an add-on lets us actually staff that work for the founders who need speed.
If your bank application is the next thing on your runway and you can’t afford a 4-week pause, the +$99 pays for itself in lost time alone.
What’s now in the 2026 compliance plan
Alongside the same-day EIN work, we’ve consolidated the recurring compliance work into a single annual plan: $399/year, covering the recurring filings that most Wyoming LLCs owned by non-US founders need each year.
Included
Wyoming annual report + license tax filing, with reminders before the anniversary deadline. Registered agent renewal coordination. Form 5472 + pro-forma 1120 preparation and paper filing — the federal information return foreign-owned single-member LLCs owed annually, with a $25,000/year IRS penalty for non-filers. Compliance calendar with reminders ahead of every filing deadline.
What’s not included
- Full federal income tax return prep if your LLC has effectively connected income (ECI). That requires a CPA who knows your specific situation. We can refer you to ones we’ve worked with.
- Complex multi-state filings if you’ve registered the LLC as a foreign LLC in additional states (e.g., California, New York).
- Bookkeeping. We can recommend services if you need one.
The point of the compliance plan is to take the recurring “did I forget anything” anxiety off the founder’s plate. Across 80+ customers, we’ve seen the same recurring compliance pattern come up again and again for the standard Wyoming-LLC case. Bundling that into a single annual price is the cleanest way we’ve found to make sure the basics don’t get missed.
What we’re working on next
Two things on the immediate roadmap, in order:
- Tighter Stripe verification handoff. We already help founders prepare the documents Stripe wants for non-US business accounts; we’re working on making that process more structured and reducing avoidable document mismatches.
- A founder dashboard that shows your LLC’s exact compliance status (annual report filed/due, 5472 filed/due, RA renewed, etc.) at a glance. Right now we manage this internally and reach out — we want you to be able to see it directly.
Pricing
$499 formation, +$99 same-day EIN, $399/year ongoing compliance.
We’ll keep the changelog updated as things ship.
