The Bureau of Corporations and Charitable Organizations at the Pennsylvania Department of State keeps the register, and its searchable database is online through the state filing system. The record searches page sets out what the search can and cannot do, and the limits are unusually strict: the records may only be accessed by the correct entity name or the entity number, not by an officer or owner name, and businesses are not indexed by type, by tax or federal identification number, by purpose or by business address.
The gaps in the record matter as much as the gaps in the index. The bureau states that its records do not reflect officer addresses, stockholders, business telephone numbers or any tax information. So a Pennsylvania search answers whether an entity exists, under exactly what name and number, when it was filed and what its status is, and it will not answer who owns it or where to telephone it. For Pennsylvania businesses by place, see the Pennsylvania county pages.
- Name or number only: no officer or owner search, and no index by type, tax number, purpose or address.
- Fifteen dollars a history: a written printout gives the complete filing history of an entity, priced for each entity number.
- Two names a call: telephone representatives search two entity names per call, on lines open from eight until a quarter to five.
- No active status: the bureau has no active status for corporations, and good standing means nothing has happened to end the entity.
Written by SearchSystems.net from Pennsylvania's own systems: the Pennsylvania Department of State record searches page, the business fee exemption for veteran owned and reservist owned small businesses, the department business fees and payments pages, the bureau forms and documents library, each read on October 15, 2026 by the SearchSystems editorial team.
What the bureau will tell you by telephone
Pennsylvania still runs a staffed enquiry line, with one rationing rule attached: in order to accommodate the volume of incoming calls, customer service representatives may search two entity names per call. Information is provided on active companies unless the caller specifies otherwise. What a representative can give is listed: the entity number, the exact entity name, the filing date, the effective date if there is one, the business type, the status and, when available, the officers, general partners or fictitious name owners.
The business purpose is given for fictitious names and professional corporations, and the classification for trademarks, while the purpose for other entities may or may not be listed. The lines are open from eight in the morning until a quarter to five.
Good standing, and why there is no active status
Pennsylvania defines standing by exclusion rather than by a positive mark on the file. A corporate entity, limited partnership or limited liability entity is considered to be in good standing if it has not been dissolved, cancelled, merged, withdrawn, effected a name change or had an expired term. The bureau then says the thing that confuses people reading a Pennsylvania record for the first time: it does not have an active status for corporations.
Fictitious names are different again, having no good standing status at all, but remaining in effect unless cancelled. For a researcher, that means reading the filing history for an ending event rather than looking for a word like active in the status field.
The fifteen dollar filing history
Where the free lookup is not enough, the bureau sells the full record. A written printout of a record search costs fifteen dollars for each entity number and provides a complete filing history of the entity, which is the document to order when the question is what has happened to a company over time rather than what its name is today. The request is made by letter to the bureau at its box in Harrisburg, and the letter must contain the name and address of the entity to be searched.
Because the fee is charged per entity number, a group of related companies costs fifteen dollars each, and the entity numbers are worth collecting from the free search first.
Filings still in progress
A researcher checking whether a recent change has gone through can get an answer without waiting for the register to update. Where a filing is still in process, a representative may give the date the filing was received and, if it has been accepted, the actual filing date and the date the documents were posted back. That is useful in a transaction where a name change or a merger has been lodged but has not yet appeared on the public record. Questions about a rejected filing go elsewhere, to the business processing section, rather than to the general enquiry line.
The veteran and reservist fee exemption
Pennsylvania waives the cost of starting a business for veterans and reservists under Act 135 of 2016, effective January 2, 2017. A business fee means any fee required to be paid to the Commonwealth or a political subdivision for starting or opening a business in Pennsylvania, and the exemption does not extend to fees for maintaining a licence or other requirement for continuing to operate. The small business must be independently owned, not dominant in its field of operation and employ a hundred or fewer employees, and it must be owned and controlled by veterans or reservists.
A veteran is someone who served in the United States Armed Forces, including a reserve component or the National Guard, and was discharged or released under conditions other than dishonorable; a reservist is a member of a reserve component or the National Guard.
Which filing fees the exemption covers
The waiver applies to the formation documents and the amounts are published. Articles of incorporation, for a for profit or a nonprofit corporation, cost a hundred and twenty five dollars each. A certificate of organization for a limited liability company, a certificate of limited partnership and the registration of a domestic registered limited liability partnership each cost a hundred and twenty five. A foreign registration statement costs two hundred and fifty.
And the registration of a fictitious name costs seventy. Each of those is waived where the document is signed by the veteran or reservist and submitted with proof of status, which may be a legible photocopy of the federal discharge form in the member copy showing character of service, a National Guard bureau form, a valid veterans administration card or a valid military identification card. Documents may be filed online, by post or by personal delivery, and may come through a law firm or service company provided the veteran or reservist signs them.
What else the department publishes
Around the search sit the pages a researcher needs next. The department publishes its fees and payments schedules, its filing guidelines, a business name search for availability questions, the federal sanctions lists, the full library of registration forms and documents, frequently asked questions, business guides and business reports, the laws and regulations behind the register, a geographical listing of legal publications for the newspapers in which notices must appear, and the uniform commercial code records.
It also keeps a business and charities scam alerts page, which is where the misleading compliance mailings that target newly registered Pennsylvania companies are named, and which is worth reading by anyone who has just filed and started receiving official looking letters.
Questions about looking up a Pennsylvania business
Related Pennsylvania records
Pennsylvania's other records guides on this site are the Pennsylvania public records law guide for the Right to Know Law, the Pennsylvania court records guide for the unified judicial system portal, the Pennsylvania property records guide for the county recorders of deeds, and the Pennsylvania county pages for every county office.