Tax declaration

The text that you had to read was a short sentence right there on the form

No. Only if scrutinized later

Google translate of what? There’s no such thing that you write on DA-1 nor on instruction to it. There is a sentence on the instruction about additional US withholding that I already told you about

Even if you had any interest you don’t need to attach anything about it, only if they ask (they won’t)

It doesn’t really matter much how you report it, but I specified cash positions last time as current accounts (Kontokorrent).

That’s correct. It’s detailed in the instructions and the forms. You put each stock only onto one of the forms: DA-1 if you want your money back from tax treaties else WV.

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Sure, if you point a finger at one sentence and give me the context, it’s easy. But I was to read and understand the whole 50 pages. It’s possible to overlook something and make a mistake…

When I finished my declaration, I got two things to print: Freigabeguittung and DA-1 form. The first page of DA-1 form is titled “Beiblatt für die Einreichung mit Fensterkuvert”, then comes the Bändliweg 21, Zürich address. (BTW this is where I sent this document, I guess that’s correct?)

Notice the underlined sentence on the bottom. Well, I guess we’ll find out if it was ok not to attach anything, because I’ve already sent it.

Funny enough, Zug just asked me for list of dividends and withdraws from my broker accounts (I have ETFs at CT and IB). Otherwise, they don’t need my tax declaration as I’m taxed at source.

I have however a question about US forms. Do I need to fill anything for them? I received from IB a form “Foreign Peron’s U.S. Source Income Subject to Withholding”:

Do you know if I have to fill that and send it to IRS? Are there any other US forms that I have to fill for US (somebody mentioned before W-8BEN)?

Hi guys, so I got a letter from Steueramt Kanton Zürich. They write, that they will not pay me what I declared in the DA-1 form (I declared dividends from VT). Here’s their explanation:

Eine pauschale Steueranrechnung auf diese Fonds-Erträge kann nicht gewährt werden, da eine detaillierte Aufschlüsselung dieser Ertragswerte (spezifische Aufteilung der Erträge in Zinsen, Dividenden, Quellenländer und den entsprechenden Quellensteuern) nicht vorliegt bzw. von den Fonds-Gesellschaften (oder Zahlstellen) nicht angeboten wird.

Anyone has an idea what this means? So Vanguard does not provide the exact breakdown of taxes paid in all of the countries, so they cannot calculate how much I already paid? But I only paid the damn tax in USA… Is this what you were referring to @hedgehog when talking about splitting VT into VTI and VXUS? But even if I do that, I will be able to reclaim VTI (single country), but with VXUS there should still be a problem.

Would it help if I attached any document? Why did nobody on this forum (except hedgehog) write about this problem? Did none of you have problems with DA-1?

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I have VTI (and had some more stuff) and declared it on the DA-1. I also attached all the divident declarations from swissquote. Got my 15% back.

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Well, that’s good to know. It also makes sense and alignes with what @hedgehog once wrote. VTI is US-only, so all the taxes apply to the US. But what about all the guys who have VT, were you able to claim back the withholding tax?

And what if I do switch to VTI + VXUS, will I be able to get reimbursed for VXUS? It suffers from the same problem as VT, it collects shares from multiple countries.

In the end, I don’t understand why is that a problem? The US charges 15%, it’s clear, so why does the Zurich tax office not pay me back?

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I don’t understand the decision from Zurich and am strongly convince they are wrong. I think you should write them back by specifying you would like to recover only the US withholding tax, not the others.

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I gave them a call and they said, in more simple words, that they need some evidence that it was withholding tax (they cannot do it “pauschal”). So I sent them my activity statement from IB per email, and they wrote that it’s fine. Phew. So in the end, you need to attach something if you want them to pay you back.

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sorry, but I think that’s what @hedgehog said here or somewhere else.

  1. No need to send evidence/attachment to normal taxes
  2. Need to send evidence/attachment to DA-1.

I personally would send all stuff for all declarations. Less worries.

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Each Canton is different, for exemple Waadt explicitly tell you not to send anything.

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Hey, so Canton Zug actually screwed me a bit. I wanted to be honest citizen of Zug and I decided to write an e-mail to tax authorities and inform them that even though I’m taxed at sourced and shouldn’t declare taxes, I can do it for them as I invested significant amount of money last year (and actually I’d like to submit DA-1 to reimburse US dividend tax). In response they send me forms:

  • WV
  • K
  • BA
  • LV/LV+
  • SV/BZ/VO/PB/WB/BK/UK/GZ/MZ/VZ (yes, it’s one form)
  • KDBK

I went to them and asked if I have to fill all of these papers - they didn’t respond anything and just gave me list of local tax advisors in Zug. Perfect! I asked them then if I can submit these papers electronically using eTax.zug software - and they said no.

My question to you guys is - is WV and DA-1 enough? And should I get a tax advisor or should I try to do it myself manually? What happens if I made a mistake - do I get fined?

Thanks in advance for any help!

I usually call them if I have a question and it works well. But maybe I only ask simple questions compared to your situation. Usually if you make a mistake and don’r really really try to cheat, they will probably or get more information from you or make you pay the extra tax or even not care at all.
You only go to jail if you falsify documents.

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Thanks! I’ll try to call them, maybe they will tell me more what should I do.

[zg ergänzende veranlagung] → “Wann wird eine ergänzend ordentliche Veranlagung vorgenommen?
Ein ergänzendes ordentliches Veranlagungsverfahren (EOV) wird nur durchgeführt, wenn das an der
Quelle nicht unterworfene steuerbare Einkommen mindestens Fr. 2’000 oder das steuerbare Vermögen
mindestens Fr. 100’000 beträgt.”

Did you earn 2000+ Fr not-already-taxed-at-source income last year or possessed 100k+ taxable wealth as of 31.12.? If no, don’t bother, waste of time and they won’t refund anything either.

15% will stay with IRS no matter what, the question is only do you have to pay more than that to CH or not as the refund will come out of your own CH taxes.

They should have tables somewhere with the answers, ZH calls them Anrechnungstarife. not sure what’s the keyword for ZG.

If it’s a plausible honest mistake and you fully cooperate should they inquire about it, no

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But now I don’t have the choice I guess? They told me that they will give me time to the end of the year and I have to send the tax declaration…

Email them back quoting that bit of their own instruction that I quoted above and say you’re under the limits and so don’t have to file this year, problem solved

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How can I prove them that I had less than 100k at 31.12.2017? Taxable wealth is only bank/borker accounts?

If I understand correctly I have to send them:

  • my PF bank account status (from 31.12.2017)
  • my Polish bank account (converted to CHF from 31.12.2017 rate)
  • my CT investments (with prices from 31.12.2017)
  • my IB investments (with prices from 31.12.2017 and converted from USD to CHF with 31.12.2017 rate)

You don’t need to prove anything, just assert it. Maybe state approximate number and say you can supply statements if needed, most likely they won’t bother as it’s not worth their time

They’ll get info on your foreign accounts automatically anyway thanks to AEOI, swiss accounts are protected by bank secrecy though, they have to trust what you say and banks statements if you supply them

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Small update. It took very long, but the guy from the tax office finally wrote: “If your married couple’s income from assets is less than CHF 2’000 and your joint taxable assets do not exceed CHF 202’000, a supplementary assessment may be waived.”

So, yeah, I just had to confirm over e-mail that this is the case and I’m done for this year.

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How come that when I enter my AAPL stocks it suggests me to move them to the DA-1, while for all other funds I have who paid dividends, the suggestion does not appear and they remain in the WV form?

In fact, if I try to add the same ETFs to the DA-1 form, they are not found from the ISIN number as they were in the WV form. Anybody knows what I am doing wrong? Last year I had very little income from dividends and didn’t care, but this year I got more and would like to do it right and get the 15% paid to the US back…