I’m on a work ARC here and my wife has a dependent ARC. She has a job offer (remote) with a US company, that has no representative office in Taiwan. In fact, it’s not an full-time employment offer, but a consultancy fee that they will pay. She will be paid in TWD in a local Taiwan bank.
Immigration/legal - is this allowed? I can’t find a specific yes/no anywhere.
Tax - we’ll file taxes together, including her income as “foreign income”. I think that should cover us from a tax perspective.
Technically not allowed, unless she has open work rights through marriage to a Taiwan national with household registration, has a gold card, has an APRC, or working holiday ARC that comes with open work rights.
However, there are many many many people doing this in Taiwan, and nobody cares, and the government doesn’t really know. The difference in your case is that your wife would be paid into a Taiwan bank, which may but probably wouldn’t cause a red flag. My (not legal advice) advice would be to try and get paid in USD.
I’m not gonna tell you to not report the income to Taiwan for tax purposes, but I will say that if you did report, then obviously they’d know…
Another angle is that, she could claim that she isn’t actually working in Taiwan, but still has a salary from the US company, and that’s why she is reporting that income to Taiwan tax office. Best not to lie to the government tho
Is she able to open a US bank and just get paid to that? I think you might need a US address for this, but if she has family in the US she could use that, and then just use a local ATM to get money out.
Schwab has no foreign transaction fees and I’ve never had any issues getting money out from 711 (I haven’t actually tested the limit, but took $700USD out in one day and didn’t run into any issues).
I guess if the US company is willing to send money to a Taiwan bank, they could also probably send it to whatever bank your wife already has in her home country (and then could just use an ATM to get money out here in TWD).
@yyy@meishijia thanks. I will ask a lawyer, but wanted to get a layman’s informed answer if possible. I could go and directly ask the NIA. My question is - what will they give a work permit for? “Work” is usually defined for certain activities within the country, mostly paid (so as to protect local jobs).
IMHO, a consultancy fee for a foreign company is equivalent to say a friend gifting me some money - as far as tax goes, we’ll declare it in the return and pay the requisite tax.
But as you pointed out above, the employment act link above doesn’t define work, and cannot define work done for a foreign corporation, with presence outside the ROC.
When they talk of “contract” or “payment”, I assume it is Taiwan sourced payment for a contract in Taiwan.
