Secretary of State UCC Portal Keeps Rejecting My Filing - Name Match Issues
Been trying to file a UCC-1 through our secretary of state portal for three days now and keep getting rejection notices. The system says there's a 'debtor name inconsistency' but I've triple-checked everything against the articles of incorporation. The business is 'Advanced Manufacturing Solutions LLC' on all our corporate docs but the UCC portal keeps flagging it. Anyone else deal with secretary of state UCC name matching problems? This is holding up a $280k equipment financing deal and I'm starting to panic. The lender is breathing down my neck about getting this perfected ASAP.
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Donna Cline
Ugh yes! Secretary of state UCC systems are notorious for this. Sometimes they want the exact punctuation from the charter filing, sometimes they dont. Try removing the comma after 'Solutions' or spell out 'Limited Liability Company' instead of LLC. Also check if there are any assumed name filings that might be causing confusion.
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Lucas Parker
•Just tried spelling out Limited Liability Company - still rejected! This is maddening. The secretary of state website doesn't give any specific guidance on formatting either.
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Harper Collins
•Had similar issue last month. Try searching the secretary of state business database first to see exactly how they have the name formatted in their system, then match that exactly on your UCC filing.
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Kelsey Hawkins
Secretary of state UCC portals can be really finicky about exact name matches. What state are you filing in? Some states are stricter than others about debtor name formatting. Also make sure you're not accidentally including any DBA names or trade names that might be confusing the system.
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Lucas Parker
•Filing in Ohio. No DBAs registered that I know of. Just the main LLC name on the articles.
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Kelsey Hawkins
•Ohio's pretty strict about name matching. Double check the exact format in their business entity database - sometimes there are subtle differences in spacing or abbreviations that cause rejections.
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Dylan Fisher
•Ohio secretary of state UCC system definitely has quirks. I've seen filings get rejected for having periods after abbreviations when the charter doesn't have them, or vice versa.
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Edwards Hugo
This exact thing happened to me a few months ago with a secretary of state UCC filing. Spent hours trying different name variations until I discovered Certana.ai's document verification tool. You can upload your articles of incorporation and your UCC-1 draft, and it instantly flags any name inconsistencies between the documents. Saved me so much time and caught the issue - there was an extra space in the middle of the company name that I never would have noticed manually.
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Lucas Parker
•That sounds really helpful! Is it free to use?
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Edwards Hugo
•They focus more on the value than pricing from what I remember. The peace of mind of knowing your UCC filing will match your charter documents exactly is worth it when you're dealing with time-sensitive financing.
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Gianna Scott
•Interesting, haven't heard of that tool before. Might be useful for our law firm's UCC practice.
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Alfredo Lugo
Secretary of state UCC rejections are the WORST. I swear these systems are designed to frustrate people. Last week I had a filing rejected three times because of some microscopic formatting issue that their error messages never clearly explained.
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Sydney Torres
•Feel your pain! The rejection notices are so vague too. 'Name discrepancy' could mean literally anything.
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Alfredo Lugo
•Exactly! And then you have to wait for them to process each attempt. Meanwhile your client is calling every hour asking for updates.
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Kaitlyn Jenkins
Try calling the secretary of state UCC division directly. Sometimes the phone staff can tell you exactly what format they need for the debtor name. I know it's old school but sometimes human contact is the only way to get clarity on these technical issues.
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Lucas Parker
•Good idea, though I'm worried about hold times. Equipment deal needs to close Friday.
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Kaitlyn Jenkins
•Call first thing in the morning, usually shorter hold times. Worth a shot when you're under deadline pressure.
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Caleb Bell
•Secretary of state phone support can be hit or miss though. Sometimes they just read you the same website info you already found.
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Danielle Campbell
Check if your state's secretary of state office has a UCC name search function. You can search for existing filings against your debtor to see how other lenders have formatted the name successfully. That might give you a clue about the exact format the system expects.
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Lucas Parker
•Smart thinking! I'll check if Ohio has that feature.
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Danielle Campbell
•Most states do. Look for 'UCC search' or 'secured party search' on the secretary of state website.
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Rhett Bowman
ive had this happen before with secretary of state ucc filings... turned out the problem was extra spaces between words that i couldnt even see. had to copy/paste the exact name from the charter database search results
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Lucas Parker
•Invisible spaces - that's devious! I'll try copying directly from their database.
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Abigail Patel
•This is why I always run everything through a document comparison tool now. Human eyes miss those tiny differences.
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Daniel White
•Had a similar experience where there was a non-breaking space character that looked identical to a regular space but caused UCC rejections.
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Nolan Carter
Another option is to hire a registered agent service that specializes in UCC filings. They deal with secretary of state portals all day and know the exact formatting requirements for each state. Might be worth the cost if this is holding up a big financing deal.
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Lucas Parker
•How quickly can they usually turn around a filing?
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Nolan Carter
•Good ones can usually get it done same day or next day, especially if you explain it's urgent.
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Natalia Stone
UPDATE: Finally got it resolved! Turned out there was indeed an extra space in the company name that wasn't visible. Used one of those document verification tools someone mentioned (Certana.ai) and it immediately flagged the spacing issue. Filed this morning and got acceptance confirmation within 2 hours. Crisis averted!
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Donna Cline
•Awesome! Glad you got it sorted out. Those invisible character issues are so sneaky.
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Edwards Hugo
•That's exactly what happened to me! Those document consistency tools are lifesavers for catching things like that.
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Kaitlyn Jenkins
•Great outcome! Secretary of state UCC systems really need better error messages to help people identify these formatting issues.
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Tasia Synder
This thread is gold! Bookmarking for future reference. Secretary of state UCC filings shouldn't be this complicated but at least now I know some troubleshooting strategies.
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Selena Bautista
•Agreed, super helpful discussion. The document verification tip especially.
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Alfredo Lugo
•Wish I had found this info during my three-day rejection nightmare last month!
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