Question UK National, Greek resident.. Estonian e-resident, where do I pay tax?

[IsabelT95]

Long story short, I recently moved from the UK to Greece. I am British and was born in the UK, but soon to acquire a Greek passport through my mum who is Greek. I currently work for myself, mainly for a UK company offering digital consulting services but I also do various digital work on the side.

I ended my employed role and tax residency in the UK when I moved. As I moved I started contracting, thinking it would be easy to set up shop in Greece. Obviously that wasn’t the case and there are delays on the Greek passport case meaning that isn’t going to happen for a while, and therefore I cannot set up a business here for now.

I’m at a complete loss as to where I should be paying tax, how much I should be paying and under what entity. I’ve applied for the Estonian e-residency option in order to use Xolo, but does this mean I need to pay tax in Greece too? And so forth how? As I’m not even yet an EU citizen technically.

My plan was to live between Greece-UK-Germany but otherwise have the freedom to travel and earn money from wherever I am at a given point. Neither my lawyer nor a tax advisor could give me a particularly straight answer…I saw a previous thread on this but it didn’t seem like the bottom of it was reached. Any ideas?

 

[bisk]

Estonian e-residency has nothing to do with your tax residency.

 

[shitcoinbro]

If you are spending more than 183 days a year in Greece, then I am pretty certain you are a Greek tax resident

You might want to de-register as leaving the UK with HMRC.

Also I think Greek taxes and banking are a nightmare

 

[Allisgood]

Long story short, I recently moved from the UK to Greece. I am British and was born in the UK, but soon to acquire a Greek passport through my mum who is Greek. I currently work for myself, mainly for a UK company offering digital consulting services but I also do various digital work on the side.

Obviously that wasn’t the case and there are delays on the Greek passport case

Are you allowed to stay beyond the 90 days a U.K. national is allowed to stay in the EU in any 180 day period while you wait for your citizenship application to be processed ?

I believe even citizenship by descent could take a while.

If you are legally allowed to reside in Greece you would register for a Greek tax number, and, as the other user mentioned, once you live there for 6+ months, you would be a tax resident in Greece.

 

[IsabelT95]

Are you allowed to stay beyond the 90 days a U.K. national is allowed to stay in the EU in any 180 day period while you wait for your citizenship application to be processed ?

I believe even citizenship by descent could take a while.

If you are legally allowed to reside in Greece you would register for a Greek tax number, and, as the other user mentioned, once you live there for 6+ months, you would be a tax resident in Greece.

No, I've had to go with the new digital nomad visa that's been introduced in order to stay. But also requires I must do my work outside of Greece, and I'm not taxed in Greece for the moment.

I could leave in December for Xmas anyway before I make 183 days, and return in Jan I suppose... perhaps I should re register with HMRC.

Thanks all for your answers

 

[Allisgood]

No, I've had to go with the new digital nomad visa that's been introduced in order to stay. But also requires I must do my work outside of Greece, and I'm not taxed in Greece for the moment.

I could leave in December for Xmas anyway before I make 183 days, and return in Jan I suppose... perhaps I should re register with HMRC.

Thanks all for your answers

I am not familiar with nomad visas so much but probably you could stay a full year and Greece would expect you and your company to be taxed in the U.K. during that time. So you would not become a typical Greek tax resident under the Greek nomad visa but remain tax resident where you were previously tax resident (so in your case U.K.).

 

[backpacker]

Long story short, I recently moved from the UK to Greece. I am British and was born in the UK, but soon to acquire a Greek passport through my mum who is Greek. I currently work for myself, mainly for a UK company offering digital consulting services but I also do various digital work on the side.

I ended my employed role and tax residency in the UK when I moved. As I moved I started contracting, thinking it would be easy to set up shop in Greece. Obviously that wasn’t the case and there are delays on the Greek passport case meaning that isn’t going to happen for a while, and therefore I cannot set up a business here for now.

I’m at a complete loss as to where I should be paying tax, how much I should be paying and under what entity. I’ve applied for the Estonian e-residency option in order to use Xolo, but does this mean I need to pay tax in Greece too? And so forth how? As I’m not even yet an EU citizen technically.

My plan was to live between Greece-UK-Germany but otherwise have the freedom to travel and earn money from wherever I am at a given point. Neither my lawyer nor a tax advisor could give me a particularly straight answer…I saw a previous thread on this but it didn’t seem like the bottom of it was reached. Any ideas?

To understand the basics, start reading this -> Greece – Taxation of international executives and -> Special Tax Regimes in Greece . With the latter pay attention to "Attracting foreign individuals to work in Greece" (page 8 and page 10 of the pdf booklet; only valid if you are not already a Greek tax resident).
Of course, the naturalization process you applied for does not make things easier.

 

[IsabelT95]

To understand the basics, start reading this -> Greece – Taxation of international executives and -> Special Tax Regimes in Greece . With the latter pay attention to "Attracting foreign individuals to work in Greece" (page 8 and page 10 of the pdf booklet; only valid if you are not already a Greek tax resident).
Of course, the naturalization process you applied for does not make things easier.

Thank you for this. I'm wondering if it's better to remain on the digital nomad visa at this rate! But it then means I can't move around in the EU as planned

 

[Allisgood]

Thank you for this. I'm wondering if it's better to remain on the digital nomad visa at this rate! But it then means I can't move around in the EU as planned

You can stay 90 days in any 180-day period.
Brexit means Brexit ;-)

 

[backpacker]

Thank you for this. I'm wondering if it's better to remain on the digital nomad visa at this rate! But it then means I can't move around in the EU as planned

If I were you: Go back to the UK before you become a resident for tax purposes in Greece!
The three new tax options (incentives) are nice when properly planned in advance and when they really fit into your lifestyle. Otherwise Greece is an absolute tax-hell. Add to it horrendous bureaucracy with frustration guaranteed.
So, go back to the UK before it is too late, do proper due diligence, take into consideration the three new tax incentives given by the Greek government and then decide what you want to do.