County of San Diego Assessor/Recorder/County Clerk (ARCC), Office of the Recorder/County Clerk

Fictitious Business Name (FBN) Statement

Any business that regularly transacts business for profit under a name other than the exact legal name of its owner(s) or exact corporate name must file an FBN Statement with the County Clerk within 40 days of first transacting business, whether it sits inside a city or the unincorporated area, because this is a state-mandated county-clerk duty performed countywide. A sole proprietor trading strictly under their own name needs no FBN; adding any other word to the name (for example 'Fiske & Sons Plumbing' rather than 'Teresa Fiske') triggers the requirement. Filing requires an original, wet-ink signature, so it can only be done in person or by mail, and a new filing must be published in an approved newspaper. The ARCC's Fictitious Business Name page migrated from arcc.sandiegocounty.gov to sdarcc.gov; the old address 301-redirects to the new one and both display the same fee schedule.