Updated September 4, 2026. Quick answer: a dissolved Maine corporation reinstates by filing Application for Reinstatement following administrative dissolution (§1422, within 6 years) or Application for Late Reinstatement (§1426, after 6 years), filed with the Maine Secretary of State, Bureau of Corporations, Elections and Commissions under 13-C M.R.S. §1422 (Reinstatement following administrative dissolution); §1426 (Late reinstatement of business corporation after administrative dissolution); §1421 (dissolution procedure); §123(1) (fees) for $150, but only within 6 years of dissolution.
If you’d rather have the reinstatement filed for you
Bizee can prepare and file the Maine reinstatement paperwork described above on your behalf. State filing fees and any back taxes owed are separate, and you pay those directly either way.
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The filing, and what Maine calls it
Maine calls this process ‘reinstatement.’ It is triggered by administrative dissolution under §1421 (e.g., failure to file an annual report, pay penalties, or maintain a registered clerk). A corporation dissolved 6 years or less may apply for standard reinstatement under §1422; one dissolved more than 6 years must instead use the separate ‘late reinstatement’ procedure under §1426, which adds requirements such as attesting to no pending litigation and explaining the reason for the late application. Either way, reinstatement relates back to the dissolution date.
How long you have to reinstate
Maine does not let a dissolved corporation reinstate forever. You have just 6 years from the dissolution or revocation date; miss it and the only path back is forming a new entity from scratch, losing the original formation date and history. Standard reinstatement under §1422 must be applied for within 6 years of the dissolution’s effective date. There is no absolute cutoff, however: a corporation dissolved for more than 6 years can still reinstate, but only through the separate, more demanding ‘late reinstatement’ procedure under §1426. (13-C M.R.S. §1422(1); §1426)
What you must pay before it goes through
Maine will not reinstate the corporation until every year it sat delinquent is paid for. Maine frames this as a Secretary of State filing fee rather than back taxes owed to a separate tax agency. Per §123(1): the reinstatement fee is $150 per application for dissolution due to failure to file an annual report, capped at $600 total regardless of how many reports/years are delinquent; and $150 for each of three other dissolution grounds (failure to pay late-filing penalties; failure to appoint/maintain a clerk; failure to notify the Secretary of State of a clerk change). (13-C M.R.S. §123(1), subsections U-X)
Whether your name is still yours
Your original name is not guaranteed to still be yours. Under §1421(5), the corporation’s name remains in the Secretary of State’s records and is protected for 3 years following administrative dissolution – implying that after 3 years the name is no longer reserved and could be taken by another registrant. Consistent with this, the §1422 reinstatement application must state that the corporation’s name still satisfies §401’s naming requirements at the time of filing. Check Maine’s business-name database before assuming the reinstatement filing will go through under the old name. (13-C M.R.S. §1421(5); §1422(1))
What the filing costs
Maine’s Application for Reinstatement following administrative dissolution (§1422, within 6 years) or Application for Late Reinstatement (§1426, after 6 years), filed with the Maine Secretary of State, Bureau of Corporations, Elections and Commissions carries a $150 filing fee. $150 per reinstatement application under §1422, capped at $600 total for annual-report-delinquency dissolutions no matter how many years/reports are behind. This is the Secretary of State filing fee. Whether ‘late reinstatement’ under §1426 (dissolved >6 years) carries a different or additional fee was not confirmed in the sections checked this session.
What this page does not answer
Reinstating the entity at the state level and squaring things up with the IRS are two separate processes. Late federal returns, penalty abatement requests, and reinstating a lapsed EIN’s associated accounts are governed by federal law, not by Maine’s corporation statute, and this page does not source them. We have the state-filing answer at primary and the federal-cleanup answer not at all.
This page covers a for-profit business corporation. If you are reinstating an LLC in Maine instead, the filing, fee and statute are different: see reinstating an LLC in Maine.
Sources
Every citation on this page is statutory or the Secretary of State’s own official filing instructions. No formation service, no registered-agent marketing page and no aggregator is cited anywhere in this cluster as a source of law; those are the only publishers of the competing versions.
- 13-C M.R.S. §1421, Procedure for and effect of administrative dissolution: https://legislature.maine.gov/statutes/13-c/title13-Csec1421.html
- 13-C M.R.S. §1422, Reinstatement following administrative dissolution: https://legislature.maine.gov/statutes/13-c/title13-Csec1422.html
- 13-C M.R.S. §1426, Late reinstatement of business corporation after administrative dissolution: https://legislature.maine.gov/statutes/13-c/title13-Csec1426.html
- 13-C M.R.S. §123, Fees: https://legislature.maine.gov/statutes/13-c/title13-Csec123.html