Korean Job Discussion Forums

[hexagonsun]

Well, I've been in Korea for two years consecutively this coming March. Last year, I was told by my employer that filing taxes was "optional" or that I really didn't "need" to do it. There was an outside chance I would have to pay and a slim chance I would actually get money returned to me. Of course, I passed at filing my taxes here. I did back in America though. I didn't think I'd be in Korea continuously for so long, but this place can be some kind of vortex, as some of us know.

To make a long story short, I got an NTS (National Tax Service) letter the other day saying that I owe 725,000 Won. My school copied the letter and spoke to some in-house accountant that said I would have to pay it all. However, there may be some other way around it which I was not told. The letter is, of course, all in Korean, so I can't post the intricacies of it. I'll be asking my native speaking friends the same thing soon.

I'm a skeptic, paranoid, and generally a questioning person. I would like to hear some input from the collective hive of Daves's.

Has this happened to anyone here?

Do you think there is something fishy going here?

What would happen if I just don't pay it?

Does anyone know of a good English speaking accountant I could talk to? I'd like to get my own take on the situation and not from my employer.

Tell me your tax experiences. Postive advice.

If this is completely legitimate and my fault, I'll own up to it and pay it. Not a big deal, but this does raise some serious flags in my head.

Oh, I'm on an E2. I appreciate the help from you non-trollers.

[winterwawa]

It sounds to me that your employer did not report all your income to the NTS and they caught him. What this means, is that your pay stub (assuming that you got one) says that you were paid X amount of won and that X amount of taxes were withheld. However, the documents submitted to the NTS said that you made Y amount of won and that Y amount of tax was withheld.

X= your contract wages and taxes that should have been paid.
Y= a lesser amount of wages actually reported and a smaller portion of taxes paid.

The employer then pockets the difference between the amount of taxes that were withheld and what was paid to the NTS. I know I will probably get flamed for this, but it happens all the time. Every university I have worked for has done this. Unfortunately, according to the legal system in Korea, it is your responsibility to make sure that your employer is honest with the taxes and how much is reported. If he under reported your income and got caught, then it is you who has to pay the shortage.

To fight this you need to get your hands on both your personal pay slips and the documents that were submitted to the NTS and then crunch numbers to see if he actually reported your income and taxes correctly or not. If you can get those records and find out that he under reported your income, you might be able to file a complaint at the Ministry of Labor, but getting all the documents comes first.

And just so you know, I have never been in this position, but only because the universities I have worked for never got caught. But I have known other who have been faced with this situation and they always ended up just paying the taxes and moving on to new jobs.

[T-dot]

Id venture to guess that the school or hagwon classified you as an independent worker.

OR

Someone mixed up your AR number with someone elses.