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[Tretyakovskii]

[Tretyakovskii]

Well, everybody knows professionals have an obligation to provide a certain amount of service, pro bono, for those who might not otherwise be able to afford their services!

Perhaps PhilK will relent but, in case he doesn't, I know there are others of you out there with analytical minds, coupled with some knowledge and experience in these affairs. Leslie certainly seemed to possess all three, but he seems to have gone underground.

Left unanswered, except by implication, is the question regarding whether I should issue recibos de honorarias, or facturas. As I mentioned earlier, the documents given me by SAT listed my status as involving, among other things, the "regimen de las personas fisicas con actividades empresariales y profesionales."

Right now, it's important that I settle this question about what form I will need, before I rush to the printer and incur what's been estimated to be a 2,000 pesos expense for 1,000 of them (I've been told it's uneconomical to print and purchase smaller amounts, though 1,000 could be a lifetime supply!).

[Samantha]

Hey, it's a long weekend and some people do have lives outside the internet forums.... hehe

I think Leslie is a she.

Maybe your accountant should be the one to tell you which way to go on that decision.

[Tretyakovskii]

Hi, Sam, yeah, I may be the exception, but I'm trying to escape having to prepare lessons! How 'bout Monday off! I just learned about it, today.

[leslie]

Bye

[Tretyakovskii]

Leslie, you're a dream. I'm not surprised you can do your own taxes. Thanks for the input. I hope to follow in your footsteps. And, I'm sorry if I erred on the gender.

I tend to agree with your about the risks of using/not using an accountant: you can lose, either way, and I'd rather take responsibility for seeing that everything gets done, and gets paid.

Enjoy your tamales!

[leslie]

Bye

[Phil_K]

...and don't forget IVA is now 16%. If you are still using previously issued invoices, you can just change the 15% to 16% by pen; it's perfectly legal.

And Tretyakovskii, if your regime is persona f�sica con actividades empresariales and profesionales, you'd be better with invoices (facturas), they are more acceptable, and professional, if you are dealing with large companies, and much easier to fill in (just subtotal, IVA, total). Goes back to what I was saying about looking professional.

See! I still give free advice!

[Tretyakovskii]

[Tretyakovskii]

Well, I took my request to a printer authorized by the tax authorities to print recibos/facturas, so that's done.

Next, I paid another visit to the tax office to file my first monthly tax return/declaration. They were amazingly well organized, polite and helpful. They did my first one for me based on the information I provided them, and said I'd be welcome back to help me with the next one. Tomorrow, I attend an orientation session for two and a half hours which will teach how to do all the forms, and calculate the taxes, for those who sell their professional services.

They also gave me codes to allow me to file my declarations online, each month, and showed me how to complete the Recibos de Honorarios. [To PhilK, the printer said I could have either facturas or honorarios and I relented to his insisting what I was offering, exclusively services, was more appropriate to recibos. I did this without disregarding any of what you'd said, considering it quite authoritative enough for me.] I suspect I'll eventually be able to make my tax payments online, as well, but initially I plan to make monthly trips to the bank to pay into the government's accounts.

I've got a lot to learn to catch up with Leslie, but I'm on my way, now, and it all looked interesting to me. (I should confess, I'm a person who enjoys reading tax codes, and doing returns, odd as that is! I don't trust accountants to get my stuff done on time, and in good order, and have always preferred to do my accounting and tax work, simple as it usually is, myself.
____________________

Explanatory note: I'm registered with the tax authorities as a person who has two income streams, one as a self-employed person selling his professional, educational services, and one as an employee of a university. It's the self-employed tax status that causes me to have to file monthly, as I understand it.

[Tretyakovskii]

Those of you who've been here a while, whose earnings from your employment are paid via the "nomina" system, who have no other earnings to declare, here, and who file tax declarations when due, is an annual declaration all that is necessary, or is more required of you than that?

Do you get monthly summaries from your employer showing sums withheld, and for what purpose?

[Phil_K]

If you are paid by nomina, you don't have to make an annual declaration unless you earn over a certain amount in a year - I don't know exactly what it is, but it's somewhere between $300,000 - $400,000 p.a.

[Tretyakovskii]

Thanks for the observation, PhilK. As odd as it seems to me, it just may be true that no declarations are required of those who do nothing but get paid wages from which taxes are withheld. (This contrasts with the case in the U.S., for example.)

That figure you mentioned PhilK may be $400,000 pesos: that number has jumped out in a number of places. They seem to reclassify you as a large contributor, at that point.

When I met with the tax man, yesterday, and we completed the first monthly declaration, he took no interest, absolutely, in the wages I'm being paid at the university, and did not include any mention of it in the declaration, concerning himself only with the self-employment income and IVA collected from clients (I didn't have any in January, so the return was "en ceros"). I now have some, as of today, so February's return, due in March, will be a little more complicated.

Today, I attended a 1.5 hour long orientation session at the tax offices: it's taught in Spanish, which carries it's own challenges, but it was useful, nevertheless, as they went through how to calculate the taxes due. It's not so different from other tax systems I've experienced, with tables showing the taxes at each level of taxable income.

Many readers may wonder why I'm bothering with all this tax stuff, but it's because I'm planning to be very visible with advertising of my services as a teacher and it's a form of self-defense!

[Tretyakovskii]

For this one, I'm going to need somebody like PhilK, or other person who's collected fees from clients, provided them a recibo or factura, and then used those to report income to hacienda. First, I'll tell you my experience and understanding, then ask my question, which is of a practical nature, I think.

When I've paid for services, no recibo or factura was provided me unless I asked for one. Then, I had to provide my RFC and domicilio, which were notated on the recibo, or factura. (If I didn't request one or the other, at most I got a cash register receipt or a hand written, informal receipt from the service provider; in many cases, nothing at all.)

I've begun to offer classes, and have some students expressing interest. I assume some of them will request recibos, provide me their information so I can execute one, and I'll do so: there will, undoubtedly be others who don't care if they get a recibo at all.

Suppose no one asks for a recibo, no one provides me their tax info, and I haven't written a single recibo for a month. Is there a means to report income, and IVA retained, other than through executed recibos? If not, doesn't it become necessary for me to insist that at least some of them hand over their tax info so I can give them a recibo?

I'm interested to hear the reaction of those with real life experience in dealing with this.

[Tretyakovskii]

Anybody have any guidance to offer on my question, above? I've now started teaching some students, and not a single one has expressed interest in getting a recibo. Soon, I'll have to decide how to respond.

One person I spoke with about this who has a business, and works with facturas, said they wrote facturas naming the "public in general" for those who did not want tax documentation.

What have some of you done to deal with this issue?

T.