Why am I paying Tax?

[Tubby]

The wife works for an international school and I have a spouse visa off her work permit. Her school is taxing me on her salary. We have questioned it many times but they say that's how the tax system works. So she is getting taxed twice. This has added up over the last 3 years to a lot of money. 

 

Can anyone confirm this to be correct? Why on earth would I pay tax when I cannot legally work here?

 

I just recently purchased health insurance and its tax deductible, Not for me though because I don't have a tax number in my name.

 

Any knowledge would be much appreciated. 

[Puchaiyank]

Welcome to Thailand...you have just entered the twlight zone...forget logic and common sense...watch your step please...you will be assimilated...????

[Tubby]

Been here 17 years. Never paid tax on wife salary before. 

 

 

[JimGant]

Makes no sense. You, with no Thai taxable income, are much better off being included on your wife's tax return, as filing jointly gives an extra 60000 exemption. Do a return for her filing singly. Then, one filing jointly. If the latter has more taxation than the former, yeah, someone's plugging in erroneous income figures.

[irwinfc]

that doesn't make sense. does the school file the taxes for your wife? if they do, you better contact the revenue department to straighten things out.

[Tubby]

24 minutes ago, JimGant said:

Makes no sense. You, with no Thai taxable income, are much better off being included on your wife's tax return, as filing jointly gives an extra 60000 exemption. Do a return for her filing singly. Then, one filing jointly. If the latter has more taxation than the former, yeah, someone's plugging in erroneous income figures.

Interesting. How would I go about this? Do I need an accountant?

thanks

[userabcd]

Go along to the tax office and discuss it with them, I'm sure they will advise you correctly.

[Berkshire]

2 hours ago, Tubby said:

This has added up over the last 3 years to a lot of money.  

 

1 hour ago, Tubby said:

Been here 17 years. Never paid tax on wife salary before. 

So have you been paying taxes last 3 years, or never for 17 years?

 

Anyways, if you don't have any income and didn't even file tax returns, don't understand how you can be taxed.  Unless it's being taken out of her paycheck somehow....perhaps for something else.  There must be some extenuating circumstances we don't know about, i.e., not normal.

[Tubby]

 

 

 

1 minute ago, Berkshire said:

 

So have you been paying taxes last 3 years, or never for 17 years?

 

Anyways, if you don't have any income and didn't even file tax returns, don't understand how you can be taxed.  Unless it's being taken out of her paycheck somehow....perhaps for something else.  There must be some extenuating circumstances we don't know about, i.e., not normal.

 

[Tubby]

yeah, 17 years never paid. Only started 3 years ago at this international school. We are in had yai, will look at going to the tax peepz.

[Tubby]

5 minutes ago, lewis9963 said:

Because you take all the services given by the government. So every people pay tax to the government.

like what? I dont take any service from the government, and when I do, I have to pay...Load of rubbish

[ThaiBunny]

2 minutes ago, Tubby said:

like what? I dont take any service from the government, and when I do, I have to pay...Load of rubbish

You don't use the public roads then?

[Tubby]

1 minute ago, ThaiBunny said:

You don't use the public roads then?

hey guys, unless you know what you are talking about then please dont post. You have no idea what you say. I dont earn a wage, therefore I dont pay tax. 

[Blue Muton]

5 minutes ago, Tubby said:

hey guys, unless you know what you are talking about then please dont post. You have no idea what you say. I dont earn a wage, therefore I dont pay tax. 

I don't earn a wage here. I don't pay income taxes here but I still pay sales tax/VAT, anual vehicle registration (which is a form of tax) etc, as I suspect you do.

[Aussieroaming]

Are the taxes identified e.g. fringe benefits which are additional to the base salary tax?

[scoutman360]

Reading the replies, I think there needs to be some clarification from the OP.

 

1. They are deducting twice tax as much as they should from your wife's monthly income.

or

2. In addition to above, they are also doing your wire's annual tax returns and showing that she owes double what she/you really should (assuming they are filing you jointly).

 

If they are deducting twice as much as they should, you would easily get it back doing your own tax returns correctly (P.N.D.91 form). if they are doing the returns, then better you get down to the revenue department with copies to get this sorted out.

 

No way would they be filing an individual return for you since you don't have a tax ID number.

 

[Aussieroaming]

Read this for personal income tax regulations in Thailand

http://www.rd.go.th/publish/6045.0.html

[JimGant]

Definitely need to get someone independent from the school to assess the PND1 withholding forms, and the subsequent PND91 personal income tax filing form. It sounds like someone other than yourself or wife filed the PND91 -- and this is where you'll see any errors (as well as in the PND1 forms, which the school filed). It's possible you're being taxed for income in-kind, if, say, you're living in school-provided housing. Anyway, need to talk to a Thai tax expert. Oh, I don't know if your health premiums could be deductible on your wife's joint Thai tax filing -- but if so, and you need a Thai tax ID, this should be easy to obtain -- at least it is for those of us with fixed deposit accounts, and want to reclaim our annual 15% at source tax withholdings.

[Tubby]

Thanks for all the peepz that replied on-topic. I will go see a tax expert tomorrow.

[Tubby]

2 hours ago, Blue Muton said:

I don't earn a wage here. I don't pay income taxes here but I still pay sales tax/VAT, anual vehicle registration (which is a form of tax) etc, as I suspect you do.

how about you read the original post before making yourself look an ass with stupid comments.

[Kwasaki]

5 hours ago, Tubby said:

This has added up over the last 3 years to a lot of money. 

3 years and your asking now.

 

[JimGant]

43 minutes ago, Tubby said:

I will go see a tax expert tomorrow.

Let us know what you find out. This seems very curious.

[Blue Muton]

1 hour ago, Tubby said:

how about you read the original post before making yourself look an ass with stupid comments.

You then went on to say you don't earn a wage so you don't pay tax - which made you look pretty assinine yourself. Put your own house (comments) in order before you start with your childish insults.

[Time Traveller]

Tubby, I think you might not be giving us the full picture. Not your fault but I suspect something is not being explained to you correctly by your wife's employer. Maybe due to language barrier?

So, for personal income tax. Only the earner has a tax liability. However, married couples can choose to either file seperate tax returns or to file together. (before the change several years ago married couple filed together).

If you do this, and only one spouse has all the income, then combined the taxes are slightly higher than if you filed seperately with income split between the 2 spouses. 

Now it's possible the employer is trying to lower your tax bill by doing an income split between your wife and yourself (not quite legal) so effectively for tax purposes you would have an income and tax obligation. Or, they could be trying to tell you in bad English, that because you elect to be treated as combined spouses for tax that you will need to pay extra tax.

 

So, you need to speak with them to fully understand what they are doing. (Thai employers have a really freekin patronising habit of telling their foreign staff "don't worry we'll do the thai taxes for you, farang not understand thai"). OTherwise, if you have other income, the employer will 100% screw up your tax return.

I strongly recommend telling them that you will arrange to do your own taxes and to only withhold the required amount each month. The people at the Revenue Department are very helpful at helping you fill in returns at year end. Easily the most professional and polite Government department by a large margin.

Good luck!  

[mrmicbkktxl]

18 hours ago, JimGant said:

Makes no sense. You, with no Thai taxable income, are much better off being included on your wife's tax return, as filing jointly gives an extra 60000 exemption. Do a return for her filing singly. Then, one filing jointly. If the latter has more taxation than the former, yeah, someone's plugging in erroneous income figures.

please,could you explain a bit more?

[smccolley]

Just got back from being audited yesterday. Even though I pay a huge chunk of tax every year, they said my company did my taxes wrong and I owe another ~300k THB. For this I get police protection...err no I don't, I have to pay for that extra. I get water service... err no I don't, only about 10 liters a day trickles up so I pay for a water truck. I get roads... err no, if I didn't have a 4x4 I would sink into the endless potholes to my house. I get butkis for million baht a year in tax.

 

The folks at the tax place were pretty nice and compassionate, but the laws are just draconian. They did try and find any deductions they could for me, but the options were limited. If I were you I would head to the local revenue office and ask them, they went out of their way to try and help me.

[exemplary21]

17 hours ago, Tubby said:

Thanks for all the peepz that replied on-topic. I will go see a tax expert tomorrow.

 

Surely it would be better to go and speak to the Revenue Department. Take all the docs and see what they say.

[batata]

welcome to LOS they allow you to buy (any kind of) property, pay for visa (temporary permission to stay) and all of a sudden they kick you out, sometimes,  for no apparent reason and  now paying taxes?

[JimGant]

3 hours ago, Time Traveller said:

If you do this, and only one spouse has all the income, then combined the taxes are slightly higher than if you filed seperately with income split between the 2 spouses. 

Yeah, but you can't file separately using half the wife's income as your own. If you could, then tubby's problem would be paying much less tax than if all the income was attributed to the wife (which is legally and practically -- for the tax collectors -- the way it should be).

 

 

4 hours ago, Time Traveller said:

Or, they could be trying to tell you in bad English, that because you elect to be treated as combined spouses for tax that you will need to pay extra tax.

https://www.tiscoasset.com/en/asset/html/tax-calculator.jsp

 

Using the above calculator, say the wife earns 220,000 baht/year. If she were single, her taxable income would be 60,000 -- same as if she filed married filing singly. Now, if she files with a spouse like tubby, with no income, she gets an extra 60,000 spousal allowance -- and her taxable income becomes zero.

So, sounds like the company is using "single" as tax filing option, for withholding and subsequent taxation. As shown, this would add 60,000 to taxable income.

[JimGant]

3 hours ago, mrmicbkktxl said:

please,could you explain a bit more?

See above post.