Double taxation?

Taxes
1

Hey there,
I have been a loyal reader of the forum for quite a while, but it took me until now to sign up…I know, shame on me;-)
Promise that I will do a proper introduction of me soon.

What I wanted to ask the community is the following:
This week I started with my 2019 tax return and I have one complication.
I got married in 2019, so I need to include my wife and do a combined tax return.
However, my wife was working and living in Spain throughout the whole 2019 (she only recently moved to Switzerland).
She therefore paid her taxes already in Spain in 2019.
If I include now her income from Spain into our 2019 tax statements, this results that we would be taxed twice (once in Spain on her income and once again here in CH).
Does anyone have any experiences on how to avoid that or is it just as it is? This would seem to me not very fair to be honest…
I will of course get in touch with a tax consultant, however, I wanted to drop the question here to the community as perhaps someone had a similar case and can help.
Thanks in advance and looking forward to more conversations.
Cheers
P

1 Like
2

Hello Pablo,

If your wife worked in Spain in 2019 I think is not necessary include her income in Swiss tax. (She moved to Switzerland in 2020 ,isn’t?)
I had the same situation in 2017 (I’m from Spain too)

Regards,
Oscar

3

Better to ask your tax office I think.

2 Likes
4

Hola Oscar😉
Correct, she moved and registered in CH in 2020 only.
However, I called once the tax office and they told me that if my civil status was “married” on 31st of Dec, I then need to include her in my tax return.
One idea I had is to set her income as zero and comment on it or as a second option select that she was unemployed (however this is not true and the last thing I want to do is actually run into issues with the tax authorities😉).
Br
P

5

Hola!

You need to do:

  • Yes, with your status married you need to include your wife in the tax but only for information.
  • She not worked in switzerland in 2019 (not unempoyed either) so you don’t need to introduce any incomes for her.

Regards,
Oscar

1 Like
6

Great!! Thats what I was hoping to hear.
Will give it a try like this😊
Gracias y saludos

7

Hi Pablo,

You’ll have to include your wife’s income in your 2019 tax return and a small explanation note saying that she lived, worked and paid taxes in Spain in 2019.

However, she won’t be taxed on it in Switzerland. It’ll be considered for tax rate determination only.

Example:

Your income 70 (CH), her income 70 (SP)
70 (CH) taxed at the worldwide rate of 140 (CH+SP).

The same treatment may applied to her wealth (bank accounts, investments) and other income (interest, dividends etc) --> to be confirmed by your cantonal tax authorities.

Be ready to provide any additional information/documents to the Swiss tax authorities.

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8

I am in a similar situation and the information that I’ve received are aligned with what @Guillaume_GVA wrote.

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