Non-resident taxation and withholding

The question and deliverable

We examine the nature of income, recipient facts, contract and treaty evidence, then organise the agreed opinion, computation and compliance inputs. The payer’s documentation should support the position taken.

Prepare a payment brief identifying the contracting parties, recipient, country, currency, amount and expected remittance date. Explain what the payer receives and where the relevant activities take place. Identify any advance, instalment, reimbursement or tax-bearing clause separately. These facts define the question for review and make it easier to identify missing information before the payment team acts.

Evidence to prepare

• Agreement and invoice
• recipient residency and entity details
• tax residency evidence
• service or royalty description
• payment timeline
• prior certificates.

Check that the invoice, contract and residency evidence identify the same recipient, and retain the period covered by each document. Where a group company collects payment for another entity, document the arrangement instead of assuming the bank beneficiary is the supplier. Keep the signed agreement and relevant amendments together, with unresolved factual questions assigned to the business team.

A fact that can change the analysis

A software purchase, hosted service and licence of intellectual property can raise different questions. The commercial description must be understood before choosing a withholding treatment.

For a software arrangement, provide the actual rights granted, access terms and any separately supplied support or implementation work. A short invoice label such as “subscription” may not explain the transaction. The review should record the facts relied on and distinguish questions about contractual rights from questions about how the service is delivered; neither should be inferred solely from a product name.

Engagement boundaries

Bank documentation, certificate signing and foreign tax advice are separately agreed. No zero-withholding result is promised.

The written proposal confirms the taxpayer, period, deliverables and fees. Identify any payment, response or appeal date at the start.

The handover connects the agreed position to the specified payment and records assumptions, missing evidence and actions for the payer. Confirm who will prepare any required remittance documents, arrange certification and reconcile the eventual payment with the computation. If the recipient, contract or amount changes, flag that change before reusing the earlier advice for another remittance.