Korean Job Discussion Forums

[linguo]

Question about potential problem getting paid:

I'm married to a Korean and have an F-2-1 visa. I have the opportunity to give some workshops live over the internet as a "guest speaker" for a university course. The workshops will happen while I'm outside Korea for a few months. I think that I would get paid from a particular fund for guest speakers.

I just renewed my visa for two years and have a Korean bank account and an apartment lease. However, the professor hiring me is concerned that the paperwork will not go through to pay me because the government agency that funds the workshops (through a grant, probably) will somehow know that I'm not in Korea.

Does this make any sense? Is he approaching this as if I were on an E visa and losing it when I leave Korea? I tried calling the Seoul Global Center and the foreigners' tax helpline. The Global Center told me to show them 50 million won and register a business. The tax people had no idea what I was talking about.

I read through the forums here and found evidence of some people supposedly registering a business without the 50 million won. I don't have that much money, but if I don't need it, I would be willing to register.

We can't register a business in Korea under my husband's name right now, because he left the country before me. He went to register once, and the tax bureaucrats actually told him, "You don't have to pay taxes. Just operate on a cash basis. Why would you want to pay taxes if you don't have to?" So, he didn't register. In the long term, I would like to work legitimately, though. Depending on who I talk to, registering is either a very complex or a very simple process. I would guess that registering as a consultant working from home would be simpler than for other kinds of businesses.

I have a bunch of online clients--mostly proofreading and translation, and most just pay me cash, but a few ask for receipts and for my alien registration number. I want to find out whether the latter group are all going to have trouble paying me while I'm out of the country. I guess, at worst, I could ask them to pay me after I get back. I've never had trouble collecting from anyone.

Any INFORMED opinions about where I can get more info?