Bloggers need to pay taxes.
Today, I’ve been seeing a lot of news that bloggers, filmmakers, digital workers and freelancers need to pay taxes. Frankly, I’m not shocked. This has been the rule in the Philippines since years ago.
I’ve been blogging for more than a decade now and when I started earning and accepting revenue for my blog, that’s when I started paying my taxes. I started paying my taxes since 2013 (7 years ago). So this news today that bloggers need to pay taxes isn’t really shocking.
Advantages of Paying Taxes
Other bloggers wonder why I get to haggle on my rate and this is because I can issue an official receipt. The reason why bloggers who pay taxes can negotiate for a better rate is because companies can book this as an expense. Imagine paying thousands of pesos and you can’t declare the amount they pay bloggers as a deductible expense? That’s basically thousands of pesos going down the drain for the companies.
Another thing is that I loved that it was so easy for me to get a Visa going to Japan 2 years ago. I pretty much had every requirement in the check list that the agency had. No sweat applying for VISA.
There are a lot more benefits like securing loans, credit cards, HMOs, etc.
How to get started
First thing’s first… don’t panic. Collate all the requirements that you need. If you don’t know what the requirements are, feel free to email bizreg@taxumo.com and they will give you a super comprehensive list of requirements. Taxumo helps process BIR registration for Php 4999 (discounted from Php 6000) until July 31, 2020. You need not go to the RDO and register; they will process it for you.
Aside from the processing fee of Taxumo (you can also do it yourself, too, if you have the time), here is my own breakdown of the actual cost.
The Actual Cost of Registration
In this article from Manila bulletin, they indicated that the only cost are Php 500 for registration fee and Php 30 for Documentary Stamp.
From my perspective, here is an approximation for costs:
Php 530 – BIR Registration and Doc Stamp
Php 2500 – Approximation of your Official Receipt (first ten booklets … yes, they need to be 10)
Php 200 – Manual Ledgers (really depends on how many BIR would require; oftentimes only two books for Professionals and 4 books for Sole Proprietors)
Php 200 – Notary for my SPA since I had Taxumo do it for me
Php 350 – Occupational Tax Receipt and Barangay Clearance
Php 250 – Delivery back to your place of all the documents (approximation since depends on the distance from Taxumo)
Php 2000+ – Payment for DST2000 if you are renting.
Total will be approximately Php 6,030. Again, this is an approximation of the costs. So Taxumo will ask for an advance of around Php 5750.
To help educate the market on BIR registration and Taxation, Taxumo is doing an Ask – Me – Anything Community Roadshow. If you are a community admin or founder, feel free to contact Taxumo via customercare@taxumo.com.
For other resources, please see these links from my other blogger friends:
https://www.topazhorizon.com/2019/03/freelancers-professionals-small.html
If you have questions about bloggers and taxes, please feel free to message me in the comments section. Search for more articles on taxes and BIR registration on this blog… I have lots! haha!
