Non US Authors Tax Information

Hi there,

I am very confused about this tax thing. I am from Pakistan and for my country, i see withholding tax rate is 0%. In a W-8 form, Tax ID Number is important to enter but since I’m an individual, not a US person and I have no Tax ID Number, what should I do? I saw the thread about this change in Envato Announcements and all the authors were not happy with that at all and they should be. Several authors commented that:

“They don’t have Tax ID Number and they are not US person”

and one of the Envato person replied that:

“As per the IRS Form W-8 instructions104 (see Line 6), if you don’t have a foreign tax identity number, you are not required to provide one and you can leave this question blank.”

What does that means…? Should i leave it blank too? If i do then will they still take 30% or 28% withholding tax out my sales profit…?

Hello,

The Tax Id Number to fill in the FTIN field of the W8, is a number issued by your own (Pakistan’s) tax administration. Most countries issues Tax Id Numbers for their residents. You’ll have to check which one it is for Pakistan.

If you submit the W8 without providing your FTIN, you will not be taxed on non-US sales, but will still have tax withholdings on US sales.

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I think here it’s called ntn Number but for that i will have to register a company if i am not wrong.

Don’t you have an identification number as an individual taxpayer?

I have an identification number which is required for tax payments and it is called NTN ( National Tax Number )… But FTIN is Foreign text identity number right?

So will it work for that…?

F stands for foreign indeed. But its foreign from a US point of view (a Pakistani Tax number is a foreign number for the IRS). Your NTN probably is what you want to put in indeed.

You may want to double-check with someone else, as I have no knowledge of the Pakistani fiscal administration.

That’s the problem lol… i have a friend and he entered his identity number and it is working for him… Yesterday i asked him but he totally forgot what option he chose because it was a year before and he is the only guy i know from Pakistan who works on TF