Anyone here a “digital nomad” (or thinking of being one)?

[Aridane]

Strange term but it seems to be a thing.

With my office shut, I’m toying with the idea of working remotely overseas and instead of my sofa at home (LOATHE working from home). It’s just a thought at the moment, no concrete plans.

But if I did it, it would probably be the EU as 1) same time zone, and 2) until end of year still enjoy EHIC reciprocal care.

Has anyone done this or thinking of doing this?

Ha, ha - if only

There is some TERRIBLE advice on this thread... OP please get talk to your employer about this and also get some specific personal tax advice. I do this for a living and can confirm:

• if you work in another country even for 1 day then depending on which country you work in, you can cause a huge amount of problems for your employer. Corporate tax, insurance requirements and Posted Worker directives to name but a few

• some countries will treat you as tax resident even if you remain resident in the UK, meaning you can end up in a horribly complex personal tax situation

• immigration requirements can mean you need a work permit, often requiring sponsorship from your employer

• the vast majority of my corporate clients including my own employer have a blanket ban on working remotely for all the reasons above - do not do ANYTHING without speaking to your HR team.

One or two people want to do this at work and have been firmly stopped- tax being one issue.

Interesting. I'd love to be able to do it. Realistically, I think you'd need to work on a freelance basis, so what you gain in freedom, you lose in job security.

Not sure if anyone has mentioned this but Estonia has introduced a specific digital nomad visa, which will be open to UK citizens.

I do this for a living and can confirm:

- if you work in another country even for 1 day then depending on which country you work in, you can cause a huge amount of problems for your employer. Corporate tax, insurance requirements and Posted Worker directives to name but a few

@aquicknamechange2019

If this is right, then the large multinational corporate I work for, headquartered in X Country, must be up shit creek without a paddle (if that’s the right expression)?

We all Have to go to head office for a bit, whether for training, offsite or general working on site.

Plus travel overseas for client meetings / product development workshops where we may spend several days working overseas.

Plus when going to meet a client, it.s usual to spend a few days working in the local office.

And not totally unusual, if travelling overseas for holiday, to spend some extra time, post holiday, visiting the local office and working there for a few days.

And, sadly, when on holiday - and it’s a trade off here between going on holiday uninterrupted by work and going on holiday uninterrupted but not necessary at the best time for you - to spend time in board meetings etc.

We do have to be careful with Country X which we frequently visit - some people more than others! - to see We don’t exceed a certain Aggregate threshold of days which then triggers either immigration rules or tax or both (I forget which).

@Aridane if your employer was my client they would be strongly advised to monitor business travel to other locations to minimise exposure to these risks. Day thresholds are one consideration but there may also be reporting requirements that need to be considered. If they're not monitoring business travellers with an eye on tax, social security and immigration requirements then yes they may well be up shit creek, depending on which locations are being visited. It's a really complex issue.

Business travel will be picked up and monitored through our travel tool through which all business travel must be booked

Key phrase there being "business travel". What we are seeing is that people are choosing to work in a different country and not telling their employers. It's then not tracked because it's not booked through corporate travel. If you book yours through the company system then it sounds like your company has a system in place to track and monitor. There will have been a huge amount of work done behind the scenes to ensure the correct thresholds and reporting requirements have been identified for each country that people travel to on official business.

If your company doesn't care where you are and items such as health care are not an issue then tax is the main item to check.

In some countries local tax liability cuts in surprisingly quickly. We have a small army of tax specialists to manage this for us as every jurisdiction is different. Corporate taxes can be affected even if you are not there "on business", particularly if your work is for clients/third parties (which can actually trigger import duty back to your base country).

If its in EU within transition period then its personal tax threshold days will be the key thing to check.