[heipei]

Employment by US company: Did that for five years working remotely from Germany for a US Incorporated. I'm German, had a German contract with all the standard provisions for Germany (mandatory vacation, termination protections etc, employer contributions to health-care etc). Worked without a hitch, like being employed by a DE entity. The only gotcha is that my monthly pay would have social contributions and health-care contributions already deducted, but would not have income tax deducted. So you'd have to save up enough money to pay income tax yourself at the end of the year (or quarterly, depending on how competent your local tax office is). After five years the US parent incorporated a German subsidiary, and since then the taxes were obviously deducted as well.

Personal take on tax accountants or anyone in that profession: They're more than useless. As parent poster said, 99% are form fillers, so if you tell them that you're working for a US entity that is not paying income tax on your behalf some of them will flat out say "but that's not even possible" (yes, someone told me that). My tip is just to read up on some topics, band together with co-workers in a similar situation and then just do the taxes yourself using one of the popular services.

[romanovcode]

> They're more than useless.

Can attest to that. Had similar situation - Being DE tax resident however working for my own company that is not based in DE.

I had just a simple question - when and how do I pay my taxes here from the money I bring from my company that is not German. And they could not help me because they really could not understand that someone might be living in Germany but not working in Germany.

[movingbritde]

Did you ever find an answer to that question? Facing a similar scenario.

[romanovcode]

Nope. Best I got was - Send money as salary and do yearly returns as additional income.

[movingbritde]

I think taking a salary is the only way to do it. I've been reading about the concept of opening a German branch of the foreign entity as a more formal thing. But obviously I will need to seek out a professional who actually has a clue.

[siebology]

Seems like a German citizen could use Stripe Atlas to create a US company, and then hire themselves through that entity. Would be cool if someone creates and shares boilerplate contract language to hire themselves "stationed" in Germany and cover the standard provisions that Germany requires.

[throwaway9283i]

Which are the "popular services" you are referring to? Can you elaborate?

In my current specific situation there are no coworkers from Germany.

I didn't even know that a US-based company can give me a German contract. Do you know the specifics how the stuff got deducted automatically (except the taxes)?

[heipei]

For taxes I use the online version of WiSo Steuer for example: https://www.steuer-web.de These services can pull your records on file from the tax office, so all you have to fill in is any additional items (deductible expenses over the year for example).

I don't know any of the details of how the company made the employment work. If you PM me I will give you the name of our German accounting firm which handled everything.

[ohthehugemanate]

Interesting that you got it working with a US employer. My US employer never could figure it out. All the advice they got from German business lawyers was that they had to establish a presence in Germany. :|

[romanovcode]

> German business lawyers

It's because most German beurocrats are garbage when it comes to laws related to outside Germany.