IRS-Authorized Certified Acceptance Agent service for Pakistani and international founders – your original documents stay with you.
You formed your US LLC. You’re ready to start accepting payments. Then Stripe flags your account for a US tax ID you don’t have. Your funds are sitting in Stripe purgatory – earned but inaccessible – while your business stalls over a missing 9-digit number.
You did everything right. The LLC is registered. Now you’re stuck – and the blockers are more serious than most guides admit.
Without an ITIN, payment platforms treat your US LLC as incomplete. Every week that passes is revenue you’ve earned but can’t touch. The business is real. The money is real. The tax ID is the only thing missing.
Getting an ITIN the standard way means mailing your original Pakistani passport to America. Not a copy. The original. For a Pakistani founder, that’s not a minor inconvenience – your passport is the master key to NADRA records, visa renewals, local banking, and travel.
Most self-submitted applications get rejected over documentation issues the IRS never explains upfront. The IRS doesn’t walk you through Pakistani NICOP requirements – it expects you to figure it out, and most applicants don’t.
Does your NICOP qualify as a secondary ID? What if the name on your NICOP doesn’t exactly match your passport? What if your passport is expired? These aren’t edge cases. For Pakistani founders, they’re common situations that cause rejections – and nothing in the IRS instructions addresses them.
It’s called the Certified Acceptance Agent process – your passport stays with you, your application gets done right.
A Certified Acceptance Agent (CAA) is an IRS-authorized professional who can authenticate your original identity documents and submit your ITIN application with a Certificate of Accuracy instead of your physical documents.
Think of the CAA as acting like a power of attorney for your identity. They’re the only ones the IRS has formally authorized to confirm “I’ve seen this document, I’ve verified it’s real” – so the IRS doesn’t need the original itself.
That authorization is what makes everything work without mailing anything.
Your passport and supporting documents are reviewed in-person or through a certified remote process – locally, without international mailing.
The CAA prepares the Certificate of Accuracy – printed on their authorized letterhead, signed, and submitted to the IRS as part of your application package.
The IRS accepts the COA instead of your physical documents. This isn’t a workaround or a loophole – the CAA system exists because the IRS recognized that international applicants shouldn’t have to mail irreplaceable documents across borders.
Your original documents are handed right back to you after the review session. Your passport does not leave your country at any point.
CAA vs Regular Acceptance Agent
From consultation to ITIN issued – a clear, step-by-step walkthrough of what happens when you work with our IRS-authorized CAA.
See the Step-by-Step ProcessNo courier. No weeks without your travel document. No exposure to loss, damage, or identity theft from a document intercepted in transit. Your passport is authenticated locally and handed right back to you after the review session.
For Pakistani founders, your passport isn’t just a travel document. It’s connected to NADRA records, required for local banking, visa renewals, and government services. An 8-week absence waiting for your passport to return from America is a genuine business and personal risk – the CAA process eliminates this entirely.
IRS rejections almost always come down to incomplete or inconsistent documentation. A CAA reviews your full package before submission – every form, every attachment – so nothing is missing and nothing triggers a return.
A rejection means another 3+ months where your LLC stays a paper-only entity. The CAA pre-submission review is designed to catch every issue – form errors, document mismatches, and Pakistani-specific complications – before the package is sealed and sent.
Once your ITIN is issued, it opens US payment infrastructure. Stripe, PayPal, Mercury – platforms that currently show your LLC as incomplete will recognize your tax identity and let you activate your account.
Your ITIN is used alongside your EIN (Employer Identification Number) to complete US tax identity verification – the requirement that Stripe, PayPal, Mercury, and other platforms use to activate non-resident LLC accounts. Post-ITIN guidance on linking to your accounts is included in the service.
Not generic IRS instructions. Specific clarity on which Pakistani documents qualify, how to present them, and how to handle situations like a name mismatch between your NICOP and passport – one of the most common reasons Pakistani applications get rejected.
Common situations we handle: NICOP name doesn’t match passport, expired primary passport, multiple middle names, transliteration differences between documents. None of these are addressed in IRS instructions – we navigate them for you before submission.
The CAA assembles your entire application package – the W-7 form, the COA, all supporting documents – formatted exactly the way the IRS expects to receive them.
Every detail of Form W-7 has specific requirements. The COA must be on official letterhead. Supporting documents must be organized in IRS-specified order. One error in any of this triggers a rejection. As an IRS-authorized agent, we know exactly what “IRS-ready” looks like.
Postal submission adds weeks before the IRS even begins processing. CAA-submitted packages skip that delay because the authentication is already complete and certified before the package is sent.
When you mail your passport directly, it takes weeks to arrive at the IRS. Then processing starts. With a CAA package, the IRS receives a complete, certified bundle and can begin processing immediately. The 7-11 week timeline starts from the day it arrives – not after additional back-and-forth.
No commitment required. We confirm your eligibility and document situation before anything else.
Ready to begin
No commitment required. We confirm your eligibility and document situation before anything else. If there’s an issue we’ll tell you upfront – before you pay for the full service.
Here’s exactly what you get. No surprises, no hidden scope. Everything required for a complete, IRS-ready ITIN application.
Pricing is based on documentation complexity. We confirm everything during the free consultation – before you commit.
A lot of founders ask: can’t I just mail my passport and do this myself? You can. Here’s what that actually looks like:
No passport mailing. No DIY rejection risk. One fixed engagement, done right.
Our CAA service is priced based on the complexity of your documentation and application history. Most Pakistan-based founders complete the process within a single fixed-fee engagement.
A few things affect the final price – how many documents need authentication, whether this is your first application or a resubmission after a previous rejection, and the specific structure of your US business entity. We confirm your exact fee during the free consultation – before you commit.
What affects the final price
If we spot a documentation issue during the consultation that affects your eligibility, we tell you before you commit to the full service. Not after.
Service Pricing
Confirmed during your free consultation – before any commitment
SaaS Founder, Karachi
E-commerce Founder, Lahore
Freelance Agency, Islamabad
Each testimonial will include the founder’s name, business type, city, the specific problem they faced, and the outcome they achieved – including whether Stripe was activated, how long the process took, and whether their passport was ever mailed. Your next step is a free consultation – no commitment required.
Everything you need to know about the CAA process, Pakistani documents, and what to expect after your ITIN is issued.
A Certified Acceptance Agent is an individual or entity the IRS has formally authorized to review and authenticate identity documents on behalf of ITIN applicants. CAAs submit applications with a Form W-7 COA – a Certificate of Accuracy – instead of requiring you to send your original documents. Your passport stays in your hands the whole time.
Not if you work with a CAA. Your original passport stays with you – the CAA authenticates your documents locally and submits a Form W-7 COA, which the IRS recognizes in place of your originals. For international founders, this is the whole point of using the CAA process.
It’s an official document prepared and signed by the CAA on their authorized letterhead. It tells the IRS that the CAA has personally reviewed and authenticated the applicant’s original identity documents. The IRS accepts it instead of the physical originals, which is why you don’t have to mail anything internationally.
Yes. The CAA process is specifically designed for non-resident individuals – including those based in Pakistan. You don’t need to travel to the US or visit an IRS office at any point.
It depends on your specific situation. A valid passport is the preferred primary document. NICOP can sometimes serve as supporting documentation, but if there’s a name mismatch between your NICOP and passport – which is pretty common for Pakistani applicants – that needs to be resolved before anything gets submitted. We catch these issues during the consultation.
The scope of authorization is much broader for a CAA. CAAs can authenticate nearly all foreign identity documents and issue the Certificate of Accuracy (Form W-7 COA). Basic Acceptance Agents can’t do this – which means applicants using a basic agent may still need to mail original documents to the IRS, which defeats the purpose.
The IRS typically processes complete applications within 7 to 11 weeks. Going through a CAA means your package arrives complete and IRS-ready, so you’re not adding delays from rejections or requests for additional documentation.
An ITIN is one of the key requirements for US tax identity verification – something Stripe and other payment platforms require for non-resident LLC owners. Once it’s issued, you can use it alongside your EIN to activate your account and start receiving payments.
Rejections usually happen because of incomplete or inconsistent documentation – which is exactly what the CAA review process is designed to catch before submission. If the IRS requests additional documentation after the package is sent, we support you through that too.
No. This is strictly a US tax identity service under IRS regulations. We handle ITIN applications only – no immigration advice, no visa guidance, no legal counsel of any kind.
Every concern below comes from real conversations with founders at the same stage you’re at. Click any to see our response.
How do I know the CAA is actually authorized by the IRS?
Every CAA operates under a formal written agreement with the IRS – it’s not a self-declared credential. We can provide our IRS authorization reference on request, and you can independently verify CAA status through the official IRS CAA locator on the IRS website.
What if the IRS rejects my application even after using a CAA?
Rejections after a CAA submission are rare because the pre-submission review catches issues before the package goes out. In the uncommon case that the IRS requests additional documentation, we stay with you through the resubmission at no extra charge for our time.
I’ve already applied once and got rejected.
This is actually one of the most common situations we handle. Most self-submitted applications are rejected because of missing or mismatched documents – not because the applicant is ineligible. We look at what went wrong, fix it, and resubmit with a complete, IRS-ready package.
Is this only for LLC owners? I’m not sure my structure qualifies.
CAA services are available to any individual who needs an ITIN – LLC members, sole proprietors, individuals with US-sourced income. Your eligibility gets confirmed during the free consultation, before any commitment is made.
What if I pay and it doesn’t work?
Our pricing is fixed and transparent. We don’t bill for failed applications. If your documentation doesn’t meet IRS eligibility requirements, we tell you before you pay for the full service. Not after.
Your LLC is formed. Your business model works. The only thing standing between you and a fully operational US business is a secure, IRS-recognized tax identity.
Platforms like Stripe and Mercury are tightening their ITIN requirements for non-resident LLC owners. The window to set this up cleanly – without scrambling through rejections and delays – is now. We handle the entire process. You keep your passport.
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