Set Up Legal Entities

A legal entity is a representation of your company and gives your Coupa customers the information they need to do business with you, including addresses and payment methods (previously referred to as remit-to details). You may have several legal entities associated with your business.

Legal entities are registered, seen, edited and merged by account administrators. 

The following sections explains: 

• How to create a legal entity
• How to view legal entities
• How to edit legal entities
• How to merge legal entities

Create a legal entity in the CSP

As a new user, when you register to the Coupa Supplier Portal (CSP) for the first time, the assistant guides you through the creation of a legal entity and an associated payment method as part of the onboarding process. To see the legal entities, read the How to view legal entities section below. 

To create a new legal entity:

1. Log in to the CSP.
   Note

   If you enabled multi-factor authentication (MFA) for financial data, the CSP prompts you to authenticate before you can create a new legal entity. For more information, see Manage Multi-Factor Authentication.
2. From the top navigation bar, select Business Profile > Legal Entities.
3. Select the Create button under the Legal Entities header.
   This displays a form.
4. Fill out the form. 
   The form contains the following items: 
   • Legal Entity Name:
     Official name of your business that is registered with the local government.
   • Country or Region:
     Country or region where your business is located. You cannot change this field after the legal entity has been registered.
     
   • Invoice from Address:
     Address that you invoice from or the address that you receive mailed and in-person payments.
   • Ship from Address:
     Address that you send your commodities from. It can be the same Invoice from Address or a different one. 
5. Select the Save button. 
   The page displays the following message: 
   "Your Legal Entity setup is now complete. If you would like to add new Payment Methods to this Legal Entity which your customers can use to pay you, please click continue below."
   
   
6. Select Continue to add new payment methods to this legal entity or Close to return to the Legal Entities page. 

View legal entities

You can see the Legal Entities page in the CSP following these steps:

1. Log in to the CSP.
   Note

   If you enabled multi-factor authentication (MFA) for financial data, the CSP prompts you to authenticate. For more information, see Manage Multi-Factor Authentication.
2. From the top navigation bar, select Business Profile > Legal Entities.
   The window displays a table with all legal entities created, or none if you have not yet added your first.
3. Select from the options displayed on screen, detailed below. 

At the top of the results table, you can see:

• Create button: to create new legal entities, as explained below in this same page.
• Search bar: to find any legal entity registered under your organization.
• Filter button: to find a specific legal entity by filtering results searching the values in the Customer and Linked Payment Method fields.
• More options menu: Select the three-dot-menu on the top right of the window to view the Export as CSV option. This exports and downloads a document in .csv format with the information of all registered legal entities of your organization.

Legal Entities results table 

The main table in the legal entities page displays all registered legal entities in rows. The columns of the table contain the names described in the table below: 

You can hover over a specific legal entity row to edit its information. 

Edit legal entities

As an administrator, you can edit a legal entity’s fields without the need to create a new one.  

You cannot edit legal entities that include Coupa Pay as a payment method.

To edit a legal entity: 

1. Log in to the CSP.
   If you enabled multi-factor authentication (MFA) for financial data, the CSP prompts you to authenticate before you can create a new legal entity. For more information, see Manage Multi-Factor Authentication.
   
2. From the top navigation bar, select Business Profile > Legal Entities.
   The window displays a table with all legal entities created, or none if you have not yet added your first.
3. Hover over a specific legal entity’s name.
   The row will change the background color to gray and a blue pencil icon appears next to the name. 
4. Select the pencil icon.
   The Edit Legal Entity window appears. 
5. Make the changes in the fields you require.
   Uneditable fields are: Country, Invoice-From Address (Country) and Tax Registration. If you require to change one of these fields, create a new legal entity. 
6. Select the Save button on the lower right corner. 

Merge legal entities

As an administrator, you can merge a legal entity with another if certain conditions are met. All the payment methods associated with the legal entities (up to 50 payment methods) are included in the final legal entity. The merge does not impact any in-flight processes the entities might have pending. 

This action cannot be undone. 

You can merge two or more entities when: 

• The country of the primary entity and secondary entity are the same.
• The tax registrations of the secondary legal entity matches the Tax ID of the primary legal entity, or includes a subset of the primary entity’s tax registrations.  

You cannot merge entities when: 

• A legal entity does not have a Tax ID.
• Legal entities have different Tax IDs.
• A legal entity has Coupa Pay as a registered payment method.

To merge a legal entity: 

1. Log in to the CSP.
2. From the top navigation bar, select Business Profile > Legal Entities.
   The window displays a table with all legal entities created, or none if you have not yet added your first.
3. Select the three-dot-menu on the top right of the window to view the Merge Legal Entities option. 
   The menu is located on the right of the filter button.
   
4. Select the Merge Legal Entities option.
   The Merge Legal Entity window appears. 
5. Select a Primary Legal Entity from the dropdown field.
   This list displays a list with all the legal entities that do not have any Coupa Pay (CPay) registered payment methods.
   The resulting final legal entity will keep the Country and Tax ID of the Primary Legal Entity, so select the legal entity with the Country and Tax ID you want to keep as the primary legal entity. 
6. Select a Secondary Legal Entity (or more than one) from the dropdown field.
   This list displays a list with all the legal entities that do not have any Coupa Pay (CPay) registered payment methods.
   The secondary legal entities can only be merged when tax registrations and country of the secondary legal entity match the Tax ID of the Primary Legal Entity, or include a subset of the Primary Legal Entity’s tax registrations.
7. Confirm the details: After you have selected the Secondary Legal Entity, the page loads a preview of how the merged legal entity will display in the following fields:
   • Country/Region
   • Invoice From address
   • Ship from address
   • Tax Registration(s)
   • Accepted payment methods
8. Select the Merge button on the lower right corner.