Hmm, if you can ‘send a friend’, then this would make a great gift. Have you thought of creating some kind of certificate/coupon?
Hi all,
For the last 4 years we have been using a Taiwanese company called TWV to run VISA and MasterCard. Last time I looked they charged a NT6000 set-up fee and then 3.5% per transaction.
Their site is NOT very beautiful and especially the English side is horrible but in 4 years they have not ****ed up the actual payments. It at least used to be that with the right papers ready you could be set up in 3 days.
Their website address: twv.com.tw/
Not the ideal solution I would say but…maybe it helps,
Elias
Stragbasher,
Thank you for your input and your idea. I appreciate all the support both past and present from yourself and this forum.
I am not sure what you mean with someone getting hit twice with an exchange rate. If someone owns a Taiwanese credit card their credit card will be billed in NT dollars at the current exchange rate. It would look something like this on their credit card… $20 US @ 33.0950 TWD = $662 NT.
At the beginning of starting my business, I knew that this would be an issue but the company that I chose to go with (www.2checkout.com) was the best that I could find in terms of per transaction fees, set up fees, maintenance and customer service. I was also under the impression (I was told by a current user of their service) that they provided ATM transaction services. When I checked their site, I saw that they did mention ATM transactions and so I automatically thought that they provided the service but I later found out that they do not provide this service YET but plan to soon.
I realize that few foreigners (including myself) have a Taiwanese credit card. It seems that some people are unaware that they can pay by cash in advance at the location of the event (Chocolate and Love, 148 Xinyi Rd, Sect. 4). This may seem like a bit of a hassle but I must have confirmed and even numbers of men and women for the event or else it will not run smoothly.
As for your idea about a gift certificate…thanks. I am in the process of adding many different features onto the website but I am currently concentrating on promoting upcoming events and getting the website professionally translated (if anyone knows a good translating service, please send me an email). The problem with giving a gift certificate or sending a friend is that the friend is less likely to show up for the event because they didn’t spend the money themselves. If the person receiving the gift is very shy and that is the reason that their friend sent them the gift in the first place; they are not likely to break out of their mold and up and go to an event just because a friend paid for them. This, of course, doesn’t happen all the time but it does happen about 1 in 10 times. Since events must have an equal number of participants, you can see how someone not showing up at the last minute could cause some serious problems as I would have an extra guy / girl on one side.
In the future, I will host gay / lesbian events, dinner dating events, single party bashes and theme nights.
Keep in mind that the company is new and I am still working out some bugs behind the scenes.
OrganizedFlirting will also be expanding to other major cities throughout Taiwan and will be in need of some event organizers in those cities. If you are fluent in Chinese and English and you would like to earn some extra money by hosting events in your city or if you own a bar and would like to host OrganizedFlirting speed dating events, please send a resume and pic with a short cover letter to r_richards@organizedflirting.com.
I am looking for outgoing, personable and upbeat individuals with a good attitude and pleasant demeanor that are not afraid of public speaking.
I will not mention how much you will get paid on the forum. The pay is good for the amount of work involved and its a lot of fun.
I am also in need of someone with connections to gay bars and the gay / lesbian scenes to run gay / lesbian events in Taipei. Again, if you are interested or know of anyone that would be interested, send me an email.
I am also in need of someone to take care of the technical aspects of my company. I have a couple of designers on staff but I require someone to maintain the website, add minor changes here and there and to implement programs that would facilitate the day to day operations of the company.
If you send me an email and I will try my best to respond but I am VERY busy lately and so it may take a couple of days.
Sincerely,
Reese Richards
President
www.organizedflirting.com[/quote]
[quote=“RAZ”]I am not sure what you mean with someone getting hit twice with an exchange rate. If someone owns a Taiwanese credit card their credit card will be billed in NT dollars at the current exchange rate. It would look something like this on their credit card… $20 US @ 33.0950 TWD = $662 NT.
At the beginning of starting my business, I knew that this would be an issue but the company that I chose to go with (www.2checkout.com) was the best that I could find in terms of per transaction fees, set up fees, maintenance and customer service. I was also under the impression (I was told by a current user of their service) that they provided ATM transaction services. When I checked their site, I saw that they did mention ATM transactions and so I automatically thought that they provided the service but I later found out that they do not provide this service YET but plan to soon.[/quote][/quote]
Reese,
Not sure what you mean by ATM transactions through 2checkout. If you read something about ATM cards in your Account/Banking details, that is referring to one of their payment methods. Until a month ago, they paid vendors by wire, check or ATM card but they’re now looking for another company to facilitate the ATM payments.
As for Stragbasher’s comment about being hit with two conversions, I think he must be talking about customers who may have a credit card issued in another country, not Taiwan or the US–you’d be converting NT dollars to US dollars to their country’s currency then, right? However, it shouldn’t be too big an issue since I believe 2CO allows multiple currencies. FYI you could also consider Paypal.
I’m starting up a business with another westerner and a Taiwanese and am wanting a bit of advise on types of companies, taxes etc. It will be a large entertainment business (inital investment around the 100 million NT mark), and we are expecting a large return on this.
We will be wanting to either have an equal partnership or over time buy out the local investor so the company must be one that can be owned by foreigners although employees would be local.
I’ve read here about the various types of businesses but what would be the pros and cons of the various types. From my reading, starting a business with it’s head office elsewhere and a branch office as a limited company - comments, suggestions?
The tax rate for a branch office is 25% net, if we personally invested in the business, can repayment of this come from gross?
I’d have thought all of this will get sorted out when we hire an accountant 
but I’d like to be aware of the situation and any ramifications beforehand.
Cheers,
Adam
Adam,
Given the size of your investment and hopefully returns you are definitely best setting up a branch office of a foriegn company. This gives you most control over your investment and makes it easy to transfer shareholding (if you want to buy out the local investor later) plus because your head office is offshore your company will be governed by their rules, not Taiwan’s. I am in the process of doing this now (we chose BVI to register the head office). One thing I’d like to note is that it was mentioned previosly in this thread that the minimum capital requirement was NT$1M, our accoutant told us it’s NT$2.5M, and that is what we are putting in.
I advise you to find a different accountant. I have helped various investors to incorporate in Taiwan. The minimum start-up capital required to form a Company Limited by Shares (equivalent to a corporation; personal liability limited to the amount of your investment) in Taiwan is NT$1 million. The minimum required for a Limited Company (similar to the above except no shares are issued, which makes it harder to recruit investors) is NT$500,000. Two other company structures are available in Taiwan (not including branch offices, subsidiaries or rep offices of foreign companies), but they’re not advisable as the investors would be subject to personal liability. And there are additional capital requirements in certain industries, but I’m not aware of any form of business in Taiwan that requires NT$2.5 mil of capital. What business structure was the accountant talking about?
Interesting point. The structure we used was a branch office of an company registered overseas. At the time we had a discussion about how much was needed, some said $2.5M, others $1M (the “some” I refer to are various lawyers and accoutants we talked to). In the end we went with NT$2.5M, this was inline with what we needed to remit anyway to finance the business. This cash had to be remitted from overseas to the branch office bank account.
Are you 100% sure that you can open a branch office of an overseas limited company with only $1M in foreign capital?
I would be interested to know.
Hi!
I’ve read the topic, interesting, very interesting. But unless I’m wrong, I haven’t seen anyone talk about Sole Proprietorships.
What’s the point regarding them ? I know there’s the problem of personal liability (that may be not a too huge problem depending your activities) but what else ?
Seems it needs no minimum capital, and the owner of a sole proprietorship can be a foreigner living abraod (and maybe it’s even possible to set it up from abraod I can’t say, I’m used to HK-UK system with off-the-shelf companies and so), but doesn’t know more about them.
Is it suitable for all kinds of business or just some very limited activities ? Anyone have more details or know where to find more details about sole proprietorships ? eg: if you start a sole proprietorship, can you re-capitalize a sole proprietorship and turn it into a Ltd Company ?
I must say I’d be interested in starting a business in Taiwan but unless I find some serious business partners (and I don’t know where to find some), I lack money to start a Ltd so the choice is: find partners or forget Taiwan at the very beginning start something in HK first, which can be hell because of business licences required sometimes.
Thanks
I was told that a sole propeirtorship needed an ROC citizen as the owner - but then again I might be wrong.
You can recapitalize a sole proprietorship and turn it into a LTD, that’s not a problem, according to my accountant.
I use a sole proprietorship for my dealings, having a ROC citizen front it for me. The risk I take are regarding quality issues, not payment isues per se, but I use it for exports only and nothing else.
There are in principle no limits to what you can do, but you do run additional risks by doing evenything under a setup where you are personally liable. However, I have so far found the risks manageable.
[quote=“Rumpelstiltskin”]Are you 100% sure that you can open a branch office of an overseas limited company with only $1M in foreign capital?
I would be interested to know.[/quote]
Actually, what I said is that the start-up capital required to form a:
Company Limited by Shares (equivalent to a corporation) is NT$1 million.
Limited Company (similar to the above except no shares are issued) is NT$500,000.
Both of those are independent corporate entities in Taiwan that shield the shareholders/investors from personal liability and tax consequences go to the entity not to the individuals. More information about them can be found in the Company Law (which is fairly thick to read through). Here’s a version of it, but I can’t guarantee this is current:
gti.com.tw/lawandregulations04.htm
It is my understanding that to form a subsidiary of a foreign company in Taiwan the capital requirement is either NT$1 million or NT$500,000 and the investors must apply with the MOEA for Foreign Investment Approval (FIA); and there is no capital requirement for a foreign company to form a branch or appoint an agent in Taiwan.
I’m not sure about sole proprietorships. I would think one must be Taiwanese, but I don’t know. I do know that you would be exposed to unlimited potential personal liability and you would be taxed as an individual instead of at a corporate rate.
You can definitely convert a Limited Company into a Company Limited by Shares (corporation), and you can probably convert a Sole Proprietorship into one also, but in such a case you would definitely need to remit the required minimum capital and apply for FIA.
If you have further questions, I suggest you ask the MOEA. Here’s a link to send them questions (but please post your Q&A here afterwards):
investintaiwan.nat.gov.tw/help.php
Proprietorships are taxed as companies. The money you take out is taxed as personal income.
Unless you really make money, the personal income tax is lower.
Any decent accountant will calculate the balance for you.
Well, I have my infos from the french economic mission
missioneco.org/taiwan/implantation.asp
(Droit des soci
My firm was told by the MOEA that the capital must be remitted into an account in Taiwan in NT$. In one case the investors wanted to partially use shares of stock to purchase a Taiwan company and the MOEA didn’t like that because they wanted to know the exact value of the investment and they felt the value of stock is too uncertain (and those were even shares of a publicly traded company). The value of patents is infinitely less certain. True, I’m talking about FIA for purchase of an existing business and you’re talking about start-up capital, but either way it’s the MOEA and I’m certain they’d reject the idea and require actual currrency to be deposited into an account in Taiwan. But, after a CPA verifies it (and you wait a week or so in case the MOEA also wants to verify) you no longer need to hold the capital. Therefore, one can always borrow NT$1 million for a week if necessary (not from me, talk to Mr. He about that) and then repay it after verification.
me no have much monies, but if I had…
Whoaa, to take the money out is actually punishable with jail here - while the risk of getting caught is small, it is there.
I looked into that as well… And - there was only one very dodgy accountant who wanted to help us. When someone told up about the sole proprietorship, we went for that instead.
[quote=“Mr He”]Whoaa, to take the money out is actually punishable with jail here - while the risk of getting caught is small, it is there.
I looked into that as well… And - there was only one very dodgy accountant who wanted to help us. When someone told up about the sole proprietorship, we went for that instead.[/quote]
Seemed to me too good to be true. I mean, if borrow some money and then give it back was enough, I think everyone would do it.
Anyone has someone to recommend for setting up business ? Been told about Anne Hu, who seems to have good reputation, but just have a name and don’t know much more.
Also, what’s the point regarding business centers or companies offering domiciliation and other services ? Really, I’m used to HK system with firms offering “all in one” services (company set-up, domiciliation, virtual office, company secretary etc …)
eg: chandler.com.hk/English/hongkong_company.htm
and don’t really know about Taiwan.
Sincerely
Larry
I am confused 
Any idea of the best structure for me? Branch office or local?
- My new company will be mostly run by me with the possibility of hiring someone else in a year or so. My wife can be a Cirecotr, shareholder, whatever if necessary
- Would like to NOT be liable
- Want to minimise tax as mcuh as possible
- Woud like to take advantage of government grants etc for small business either in Taiwan or Australia
- Exit strategies such as sale, merger are something I am thinking about - therefroe the structure needs to reflect this ability OR be able to be changed in order to allow such an exit
So - local office or branch office?
[quote=“Mother Theresa”][quote=“Rumpelstiltskin”]Are you 100% sure that you can open a branch office of an overseas limited company with only $1M in foreign capital?
I would be interested to know.[/quote]
Actually, what I said is that the start-up capital required to form a:
Company Limited by Shares (equivalent to a corporation) is NT$1 million.
Limited Company (similar to the above except no shares are issued) is NT$500,000.
Both of those are independent corporate entities in Taiwan that shield the shareholders/investors from personal liability and tax consequences go to the entity not to the individuals. More information about them can be found in the Company Law (which is fairly thick to read through). Here’s a version of it, but I can’t guarantee this is current:
gti.com.tw/lawandregulations04.htm
It is my understanding that to form a subsidiary of a foreign company in Taiwan the capital requirement is either NT$1 million or NT$500,000 and the investors must apply with the MOEA for Foreign Investment Approval (FIA); and there is no capital requirement for a foreign company to form a branch or appoint an agent in Taiwan.
I’m not sure about sole proprietorships. I would think one must be Taiwanese, but I don’t know. I do know that you would be exposed to unlimited potential personal liability and you would be taxed as an individual instead of at a corporate rate.
You can definitely convert a Limited Company into a Company Limited by Shares (corporation), and you can probably convert a Sole Proprietorship into one also, but in such a case you would definitely need to remit the required minimum capital and apply for FIA.
If you have further questions, I suggest you ask the MOEA. Here’s a link to send them questions (but please post your Q&A here afterwards):
investintaiwan.nat.gov.tw/help.php[/quote]
Mt, while in principle you are right, in practice you may not be. Your figures are only valid for companies being setup that do not require additional licencing.
In our case, the minimum capital was 7,500,000 NT$, not defined by the Company setup people, but by the licencing authority for our relevant industry.
Dear all Helo, please a little advice
With my wife a Taiwanese,we expect to open a coffee shop, can we use both of our name to register,or only in my wife’s name, or which way is better for us.
Many thanks for response
The Lavazza cafe boy Juris.