How To Find Your EIN Number

Your EIN can be found on many of your physical and/or virtual business documents. The easiest places to look are on your IRS EIN confirmation letter and any previous business tax returns.

Here are some other documents where you can find your EIN number:

• Your business credit report
• Business licenses or permits
• Business bank statements
• Other tax filings, such as 1099 forms issued to independent contractors
• Old business loan applications
• Any tax notices from the IRS

Can’t find any of the above documents? Another option is to run your business credit report online and get your EIN that way. It isn’t free, but it’s a quick way to find your EIN and check your business credit report at the same time. You can also use this method to find another company’s EIN.

Sometimes, you need to go straight to the source and call the IRS to retrieve your EIN. Typically, the hold times are long, so keep that in mind. From the IRS’s website:

Ask the IRS to search for your EIN by calling the Business & Specialty Tax Line at 800-829-4933. The hours of operation are 7:00 a.m. – 7:00 p.m. local time, Monday through Friday. An assistor will ask you for identifying information and provide the number to you over the telephone, as long as you are a person who is authorized to receive it. Examples of an authorized person include, but are not limited to, a sole proprietor, a partner in a partnership, a corporate officer, a trustee of a trust, or an executor of an estate.

Here are some people who should be able to look up your EIN and give it to you over the phone:

• Your account manager at the bank where you do your business banking
• Your accountant (or you can consult your accounting software)
• Your CPA
• Any organization that you have a business license or permit from

There are a few other places where you should be able to look up your EIN online:

• Your online account with the bank where you do business
• For publicly traded companies, the SEC’s online database
• For nonprofits, the free Melissa database

As a last resort, you could also try a paid EIN database, but we would only recommend this if you’ve exhausted all other options. And if you’ve gone through all the other options and still can’t find it, you might want to double-check that you even have an EIN in the first place.

Contact the company directly and ask for their EIN.

Publicly traded companies’ EIN can be found on the SEC’s online database. If the business you are looking to identify is a nonprofit, you can search the free Melissa database.

If all else fails, you can contact a credit bureau. They will allow you to purchase a company’s (or your own) credit report for a fee. Make sure the report you are paying for includes the EIN.

You can also try a paid EIN lookup service; some of these services will even offer you more information, such as company size and industry.