So I ordered a cell phone on Amazon yesterday. The one thing I’ve heard from every schoolteacher and small businessman was that you need a cellphone. Your clients need to be able to reach you at unreasonable times.
I checked out… what is it… the big six? Verizon, Cingular, Sprint, Nextel, AT&T. and despite the fact I pass their office every day, I forgot about T-Mobile till the last minute when I was reminded by an office-mate. Good thing too… They have the best rates of the bunch. Nicest phones. Most realistic plans (though without rollover yet). And the office-mate says the reception and customer service is good. (Advice which I take, over the protestations of all those Verizon customers who, you know, never actually used T-Mobile.)
It should be here tomorrow.
New Toy!!!
And I talked with an accountant… sorta. Sara hooked me up with her mother. Gretchen also offered me her husband. But I know Joycey, (said Mother), better. I’ve given her a list of what I need to do to legally start the business in DC, and pointed out specific places where I need advice.
Advice for those calling the DC Basic Business Licensing office? Once you get through to the automated voice system that never actually tells you how to connect to anything, and just keeps sending you to the website, (the website which sends you to the phone system)…
Just press 3.
They won’t tell you to press three. The only buttons they tell you to press take you back to the beginning of the same message. But button 3 was the first one that worked for me when I started hitting random numbers. The person that answered it said something about Corporations… but he still was pretty nice and helped he anyway.
And for the record, you do not need a business license to run a design studio within the District of Columbia.
You apparent do need one to run the following though:
Au Pair Suite
Ballet
Barber Chair (As opposed to Barber Shop)
Bird Control
Block party
Business Street Photographer
Churches (!!!)
Circus
Dealers in Dangerous Weapons (I just love the name)
Dumbwaiters (Hand Driven)
Dumbwaiters (Power Driven)
Elevator (Hand Driven)
English Basement
Escalator
Gumball Machine
Horse and Buggy (As opposed to Horse Drawn Carriage)
Marathons
Mom and Pop Store
Parades
Sidewalk Elevators (Power Driven)
Street Photographer