How we research our guides
Closing a business and letting someone go are decisions with legal and financial consequences. Here is exactly where our information comes from, what we have not confirmed yet, and where our tools stop and a professional begins.
Where our information comes from
- LLC dissolution fees and forms. 15 of 51 filing fees have been read by us on the state agency’s own page, and the date of that check is shown next to the fee. 18 of 51 state guides link straight to the page that publishes the fee. The other fees come from our own research and are marked for you to confirm on the official portal before you file. Every state guide links to the filing agency.
- Final-paycheck deadlines. 28 of 51 are checked against an official state source (the statute itself or the state labor department's own guidance), linked on that state's page with the month we read it. The rest come from our own research and are marked “not yet verified at source”. Confirm the rule with your state labor department before you act.
- Unemployment rules for resigning during a PIP. Each state row in our state-by-state table comes from the state's statute, regulation, agency manual or appeal decisions, checked in October 2026 and linked in the row. Where a state's official site was not reachable from our location, we read an archived copy of the same official page and say so next to the source. We do not list disqualification lengths, and gaps are marked as "no official guidance found".
- Federal steps (final returns, closing the EIN business account, employment-tax obligations) follow the IRS’s published guidance.
How we keep it current
- Every guide shows an “Updated” date: the last time its content changed. Where we have read a fee on the agency’s page, the date of that check is shown next to the fee.
- Fee- and form-sensitive pages carry an explicit prompt to confirm the current amount on the official portal before you file, because the safest number is the one on the agency’s own page today.
- Process steps (vote, settle debts, notify creditors, file, close accounts) are stable across states; state-specific details are the parts we flag for confirmation.
What ExitCleanly is, and isn’t
ExitCleanly is not a law firm and does not provide legal, tax, or financial advice. It is an information and tools service. For advice about your specific situation, consult a licensed attorney or accountant. Using our guides and tools does not create an attorney–client relationship.
How we make money (and why we tell you)
ExitCleanly is free to use. A few pages link to partners (LawDepot letter builders, the Rezi resume builder, the Bizee and LegalZoom dissolution filing services); those links are labelled "Paid link" next to the link, and we may earn a commission if you buy. ExitCleanly sells no products of its own. Partner links are labelled, and they never change the steps we recommend: the compliant process is the same whether or not you use a partner.
How do we use AI?
Pages on ExitCleanly are drafted with AI assistance (Claude by Anthropic). The same tools help us compare large sets of official documents, for example final-paycheck and unemployment rules for 50 states and DC.
- Where the facts come from. Statutes, state agency pages and IRS guidance, linked on the page with the date we read them. Before a new page goes live, each of its claims is listed with its source and that date. Where we have not yet read a detail at the source, such as some state filing fees, the page says so and links to the agency page for you to confirm.
- What is checked automatically. State fees, forms and deadlines are filled in from one data file that records the source and the date of each value, so a corrected number changes on every page that uses it. Scripts look for contradictions inside that file and compare stored fees with the agencies' own fee pages where those pages can be read automatically.
- What does not happen. No lawyer or other human expert reviews each page before it is published. That is one more reason to confirm a fee or a deadline with the agency before you act. We do not publish invented tests, reviews, personas or personal experiences.
Found something wrong?
If a fee, form, or deadline looks out of date, tell us and we will check the official source and correct it. Email hello@exitcleanly.com. Accuracy on these pages matters more than volume.