DBA stands for “Doing Business As”. This is a different name than your business’ legal name and cannot include “LLC, Inc, or similar suffixes in the title). One example of a DBA would be for Red Rose Insurance, LLC. We could have a DBA for :Red Rose Insurance:, or “Red Rose”. Or, if we were going to operate as a separate company name such as “Pennsylvania Trucking Insurance Pros” that could be a DBA where we operate as that name but the legal name remains “Red Rose Insurance, LLC”.
Some industries will restrict this more. For example, because we are an insurance brokerage, we need to provide proof that we are a licensed brokerage before registering a DBA with “insurance” in the name. If you own a trucking company you need to make sure in FMCSA that your DBA matches up with your insurance or it could delay your federal filings.
We often see companies register their business name exactly as their DBA. For example, we often see “XYZ Company, LLC” have a DBA of “XYZ Company, LLC”. Insurance carriers can’t issue that federal filing with that DBA because your legal DBA can’t include LLC or Inc. in the name.
