Dobleve

Tax time, everyone’s favorite time of the year, at least in the US where taxes were due April 15. They aren’t yet due in Spain, I believe its late June or so. Taxes are kinda boring and never fun IMO, you fill out some forms, do some math and pay. Its doubly so when you live abroad and need to pay taxes in 2 countries and then try to reconcile them and not get taxed twice on the same euro. In case you didn’t know, the US taxes the income of all of its citizens whether you live and work in the US or not; there are agreements to help prevent the double-taxing but the burden is mostly on you to figure it out.

This is how I found myself at the Hacienda. If you’re like me and recall this word from english, you’re probably thinking the Hacienda is a nice ranch. This confused me when, as I was doing some tax work, I was told to fill out Form 149 and take it to the Hacienda; along with being a nice ranch the Hacienda is also the Ministry of Finance here it turns out. Things got a little clearer. There is a fairly new law here in Spain commonly known as Beckham’s Law that lets foreigners working in Spain be taxed at a different (and better) tax rate. Sounds great, who wants to pay extra taxes after all?

At the Hacienda I waited patiently to submit my form at the document submission desk. When it was my turn I handed over the form and was met with a blank look. The woman had never seen this form before and made a few quick calls around the office. No one else knew anything either. I stepped aside and waited while she helped out the next people in line and waited for someone to call her back. At this point I couldn’t help thinking that being told to fill out this form was another prank people liked to pull on guiris.

After about 15 minutes of waiting I was led to an office where the man working there also didn’t know what the form was but was willing to take it from me. He took the form and stamped it and placed it in a pile, then went to take my copy of the form and stamp it too so I would have a record; I didn’t have another copy, only another blank copy of the form. I asked if we could copy the original and he said no, they don’t make copies. He patiently waited while I filled out my blank form by hand to match the original and then dutifully stamped my copy. He asked for my phone number (which was already on each form 3 times for reasons I don’t understand) and said they’d call me if they had any questions. He smiled reassuringly and I left.