Corporations get 5-month grace period to file past-due annual reports

The State Department is giving a break to companies that have overdue annual reports. (Credit: © Mauricio Pascual)

As part of the final phase of the Corporations Registry digitization project, Secretary of State Kenneth McClintock announced Wednesday the start of a five-month grace period so that companies with past-due annual reports can become current.

The window that starts Friday and ends June 27 seeks to give corporations that owe annual reports a chance meet their legal obligation while avoiding hefty penalties, he said.

“With this opportunity we are giving tens of thousands of for- or nonprofit corporations we hope to have a fully digitized and updated Corporations Registry by June 30 of this year,” he said, noting that companies can file their annual reports via www.estado.pr.gov, www.pr.gov or www.prcorpfiling.f1hst.com.

“After the grace period is over, we will reinstal late filing penalties for unfiled annual reports,” he said.

During the grace period, nonprofits will be required to pay twice the normal filing fee, or $20, for each past-due report, while regular corporations will have to pay triple the normal amount, or $300 per report. However, filers who are overdue will be exempt from paying the mandatory late penalties of $100 for nonprofits and $500 for corporations per document not filed on time. Annual reports are due by April 15 of each year.

To qualify for the grace period, the corporation must appear in the State Department’s corporate registry and must file all of the annual reports required since the entity was established.

On the other hand, companies that are not legally required to file a report or pay an annual fee, such as banks, credit unions, financial institutions, churches or religious groups that are registered as nonprofits are excluded from the special filing conditions. So are companies participating in a payment plan signed before the grace period opens.

McClintock noted that the grace period does not apply to reports corresponding to calendar year 2011, which must be filed on or before April 15, 2012, as they are not past-due.

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Michelle Kantrow-Vázquez

Detalles del autor

Reportero de negocios con 30 años de experiencia escribiendo para periódicos semanales y diarios, así como para publicaciones especializadas en Puerto Rico. Entre mis antiguos empleadores se encuentran Caribbean Business, The San Juan Star y Puerto Rico Daily Sun, entre otros. Mis áreas de especialización incluyen las telecomunicaciones, la tecnología, el comercio minorista, la agricultura, el turismo, la banca y la mayoría de los demás segmentos de la economía de Puerto Rico.

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