How does the taxation work if you're earning foreign money? Do you get income taxed in the US and Australia or just Australia? Sorry for the noobish question, but I am curious.
Australia and the US have tax agreements to avoid double taxation.
So, I have a Pty Ltd company, of which I am the sole director/employee (you can start one of these for a few hundred AUD, and it can all be done online).
For each US client, I fill out and sign a W-8BEN-E form (https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/fw8bene.pdf) which means I don't need a US SSN and the client does not need to withhold any tax from my payments.
Each month, I then bill my US clients for hours worked, which they pay in USD via a foreign exchange broker (I use OFX), which then converts the USD to AUD and deposits it in my company's Australian bank account (this works out much better than an international bank transfer as the exchange rates offered by the broker are far better, and can result in a difference of a few hundred AUD a month).
This AUD gets lodged as income for the company.
Although the company is registered for GST, because the work is for overseas clients, I don't need to charge or collect GST from them.
I then pay myself a salary in AUD, plus the appropriate amount of super. The company deducts the appropriate amount of Australian PAYG tax based on that salary, which is sent to the ATO once a quarter.
The company is then taxed on any profit it makes - but that's typically low/none, because the salary paid to me is an expense for the business, and I can control the amount I get paid so I make sure that income - expenses = 0.
You have to be very wary of Personal Services Income provisions under the ATO rules. You might need some professional advice to make sure you don't get caught out on that score. Lots of one person Pty Ltds get caught out.
I think the poster would be OK, actually. It sounds like they have income coming from several unrelated entities, have the right of refusal for work and a few other things like that. The only things that indicate PSI are: they probably get paid when for fixing a bug that they created; they are probably paid on submission of a timesheet. But overall, it sounds more like a consulting business than an employment arrangement.
if you're an Australian resident living in Australia, you only get taxed in Australia.
You will need to have an ABN and you may need to be registered to charge GST and do a BAS on a regularly basis if you're earning more than $75k/year however, you don't have to charge GST on income from overseas as far as I am aware.
So, I have a Pty Ltd company, of which I am the sole director/employee (you can start one of these for a few hundred AUD, and it can all be done online).
For each US client, I fill out and sign a W-8BEN-E form (https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/fw8bene.pdf) which means I don't need a US SSN and the client does not need to withhold any tax from my payments.
Each month, I then bill my US clients for hours worked, which they pay in USD via a foreign exchange broker (I use OFX), which then converts the USD to AUD and deposits it in my company's Australian bank account (this works out much better than an international bank transfer as the exchange rates offered by the broker are far better, and can result in a difference of a few hundred AUD a month).
This AUD gets lodged as income for the company.
Although the company is registered for GST, because the work is for overseas clients, I don't need to charge or collect GST from them.
I then pay myself a salary in AUD, plus the appropriate amount of super. The company deducts the appropriate amount of Australian PAYG tax based on that salary, which is sent to the ATO once a quarter.
The company is then taxed on any profit it makes - but that's typically low/none, because the salary paid to me is an expense for the business, and I can control the amount I get paid so I make sure that income - expenses = 0.