---
title: Tax entities and tax accounts
description: How individual and business tax entities work, how tax accounts link them to each tax authority, and how to find an entity by TIN.
---
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# Tax entities and tax accounts
## How individual and business tax entities work, how tax accounts link them to each tax authority, and how to find an entity by TIN.
### What it is
A tax entity is an individual or business that owes tax, held under a taxpayer. A tax account links that entity to one tax authority, such as the IRS or a state department of revenue. You need both before you can schedule tax payments.
### When you need it
- You are adding a client's individual or business details after creating the taxpayer.
- The client owes tax to a new authority (for example, a second state).
- You need to find an existing entity by its TIN.
### How it works
1. Create a tax entity with `POST /v1/taxpayers/{taxpayerId}/tax-entities`. Use type `IrsSsn` for an individual (first and last name) or `IrsEin` for a business (business name). The `tin` is 9 digits with no hyphens.
2. Send the address whenever you have it. Some tax payments depend on it, and when you send it, `city`, `region`, `country` and `postalCode` are required (5-digit postal code for US addresses).
3. Create one tax account per tax authority with `POST /v1/taxpayers/{taxpayerId}/tax-accounts`, sending the `taxEntityId`, a `type` (`Personal` for individuals, `Corporate` for businesses) and a `taxAuthority` such as `US_IRS` or `US_IL`.
4. List entities and accounts by your own `externalId`. To find an entity by TIN, filter the tax entity list with `encryptedTin`.
Example: an individual paying federal and Illinois tax has one `IrsSsn` tax entity with two `Personal` tax accounts, one for `US_IRS` and one for `US_IL`.
Canadian taxpayers use the tax entity types `CanadianIndividual`, `CanadianBusiness` and `CanadianTrust`.
**To add (Canada):** the TIN format each Canadian tax entity type expects, and the address and postal code rules for Canadian addresses.
Canadian tax accounts use the tax authority codes `CA_CRA` (Canada Revenue Agency) and `CA_QC` (Revenu Québec), with the tax account types `Corporate` and `Personal`.
### Common questions
### Why can't I send the TIN in plain text to search for it?
Remitian never accepts a plaintext TIN in a URL. You encrypt the TIN with the Remitian TIN encryption public key (RSA with OAEP and SHA-256), encode it as base64url without padding, and send it in `encryptedTin`. Download the key from the Developer Portal. Each environment has its own key, and the docs include code samples for C#, Node.js, Python and Java.
### Why does my encryptedTin search return 400?
The usual causes are a key from the other environment, the wrong padding or hash settings, standard base64 instead of base64url, or a TIN with hyphens. A search with no match returns an empty list, not an error.
### Which tax authorities are supported?
The IRS and the state and local authorities listed in Use Case 5, including Washington DC, New York City and Philadelphia. Use the codes exactly as listed.
### Can I create all of this in one call?
Yes. The provisioning endpoint in Use Case 3 creates a taxpayer, its tax entities and their tax accounts together.
Full documentation
- [Use Case 4: Manage tax entities (including Filter by TIN and code samples)](https://docs.remitian.com/products/wqptjtsou5/hncgxoicup/index.html)
- [Use Case 5: Manage tax accounts (full tax authority list)](https://docs.remitian.com/products/wqptjtsou5/bzxb6l93ly/index.html)
- [Developer Portal (TIN encryption public key)](https://docs.remitian.com/products/wqptjtsou5/2szsjobhlg/index.html)
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