Opening a Spanish office with UK workers - implications?
Opening a Spanish office with UK workers - implications?
Author
Discussion

Obiwonkeyblokey

Original Poster:

5,400 posts

271 months

Thursday 7th April 2016
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Evening All,

I am thinking of opening up an office in Spain to allow staff to work from there during the summer . ( Ibiza or Mallorca)

The idea would be that with connectivity and virtual office that they would essentially be based in Bristol as far as any clients are concerned but would in fact be working from a spanish physical office. the company is UK registered and the employees would also be uk registered for PAYE.

Ive seen somewhere that they would need to register in Spain for social security before working but I wanted to see if anyone else had done anything similar and what the implications were.

The dieafwould be that some staff would be based there year round, with others dipping in and out for maybe 2-3 months at a time in some cases.

Thank you

Owen

Akiraprise

271 posts

219 months

Friday 8th April 2016
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I can't really help much yet but will be looking at doing similar this summer (Ibiza) but with Spanish employee's so will be interesting to see what advice you get smile

Eric Mc

125,810 posts

296 months

Friday 8th April 2016
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Those who are based in Spain all year round would be Spanish Tax Resident and would be subject to Spanish taxes. You would need to appoint an agent in Spain to administer Spanish taxes on these salaries being paid to those Spanish tax residents.

I am sure they would also be fully under Spanish employment regulations as well.

As for those who are in Spain part time and the UK part time, you are going to enter the murky waters of determining where their tax residencies lie and what taxes take priority.

And, of course, whatever happens on 23 June this year may have a big impact on such operations.

schmunk

4,399 posts

156 months

Friday 8th April 2016
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They'll need to apply for "Beckham Law"' (seriously) taxation within 6 months of arrival in Spain. This gives a flat 24.75% tax rate, with no allowances or deductions. It is advantageous for higher earners but not necessarily for lower earners.

Obiwonkeyblokey

Original Poster:

5,400 posts

271 months

Friday 8th April 2016
quotequote all
OK, thanks thats helpful so far.

It may be a mix of residents for year round, and then uk based guys going out for "working holidays" for a few weeks at a time. Ive eben talking bout this concept for a while and keen to explore it. clearly one or two will abuse it but hopefully for the majority it will be a good thing.

what also concerns me is broadband on Ibiza as we will be running phones and office over vpn

Lauryn

68 posts

223 months

Friday 8th April 2016
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Without being totally clear on what these employees would be doing from the Spanish office, if they are generating income on behalf of the company in Spain then there is a very real risk that there will be a deemed permanent establishment ('PE') of the U.K. company. This could have a range of other issues, particularly Spanish corporation tax, so it's worth considering the arrangements on a wider tax scale.

GT03ROB

14,033 posts

252 months

Saturday 9th April 2016
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Nothing to add,but got any jobs going? biggrin

R1 Indy

4,510 posts

214 months

Saturday 9th April 2016
quotequote all
Obiwonkeyblokey said:
OK, thanks thats helpful so far.

It may be a mix of residents for year round, and then uk based guys going out for "working holidays" for a few weeks at a time. Ive eben talking bout this concept for a while and keen to explore it. clearly one or two will abuse it but hopefully for the majority it will be a good thing.

what also concerns me is broadband on Ibiza as we will be running phones and office over vpn
If its anything like Majorca, they are well ahead of the uk with fibre broadband etc.
In fact some of the beach area has free council provided wifi smile

Plus 3/4G pretty much anywhere, unlike the uk!

Akiraprise

271 posts

219 months

Saturday 9th April 2016
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R1 Indy said:
If its anything like Majorca, they are well ahead of the uk with fibre broadband etc.
In fact some of the beach area has free council provided wifi smile

Plus 3/4G pretty much anywhere, unlike the uk!
Unfortunately Ibiza is nothing like that, internet is terrible over there!

KevinCorvetteC6

13,858 posts

311 months

Monday 11th April 2016
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I think Eric tossed the most important point into the ring. June 23rd could change everything.

Obiwonkeyblokey

Original Poster:

5,400 posts

271 months

Monday 11th April 2016
quotequote all
im going over next week to view a couple of office and have made some good contacts there regardig working overseas. apparently you can spend 183 days there without it affecting your tax or residency statuts, so I could set up a virtual office and have everyone based in the UK legally but spending a few weeks a year out there assuming they dont kill themselves!

Eric Mc

125,810 posts

296 months

Monday 11th April 2016
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Be careful that you fully understand what HMRC means by "183 days".

andy-xr

13,204 posts

235 months

Wednesday 13th April 2016
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I work in many locations, mostly around Europe but also in the US. I go to an office to meet my fellow co-workers and perhaps we might go to a trade show while we're there or something. But I'm still doing my work, which is sales to UK and parts of Europe. It doesnt matter to the company, other than travel and accommodation, where or which office I'm at, or even if I'm in an office (currently in a hotel for the next few days) and as far as clients see, they call a number for me that's rings a soft client on either my laptop or phone. Far as they're concerned I'm 'somewhere' and they just want a number to call that gets through to me

If it's a perk, then there's no getting away from it. But you might like to take the team to do some customer visits for example. I'm sure there's ways to position it

johnfm

13,751 posts

281 months

Wednesday 13th April 2016
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GT03ROB said:
Nothing to add,but got any jobs going? biggrin
x 100000

Obiwonkeyblokey

Original Poster:

5,400 posts

271 months

Monday 25th April 2016
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update - heading over tomorrow for a looksee...

Shnozz

30,668 posts

302 months

Tuesday 26th April 2016
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Be interested to see what views you get here too, mainly on the internet/VPN advice as I am looking to work remotely from Spain and live a 50/50 life between there and the UK.

iphonedyou

10,422 posts

188 months

Tuesday 26th April 2016
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¿Hablas español, OP? Pienso que ayudará.

Oh y buena suerte, por supuesto.

smile

INWB

896 posts

138 months

Tuesday 26th April 2016
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Know nothing on the tax/employment front however I have just deployed a MPLS (broadband) network into Spain and it was a PITA. So if they aren't serviced offices then you will need to allow lots of time for it to be sorted. This was on the mainland btw