When businesses work with remote workers, they are able to recruit talent from all over the world. Conversely, when you work remotely, you can seek work with clients on a global scale as well. That’s a great thing for both parties involved, but international remote work also has its challenges. Here are six things you should consider before contracting with a client in another country. 1. Payment complexities Getting paid when you do work for someone in a foreign country can be complicated. Chances are, there are going to be fees. You may also face delays at the client’s end as they are trying to figure out their billing. Hence, study your options in advance and get familiar with different payment processing options out there. Just know that you could lose a bit of money in the process and face additional cross-border taxes as well. So you may want to adjust your rates to make up for this. The good news is that the expenses you encounter are likely tax deductible. 2. Cultural differences regarding presentations and meetings Part of building your reputation as a freelancer is sharing your knowledge with others. You may find yourself presenting your thoughts and recommendations as a speaker at conferences or meetings. When you do, be sure to tailor your approach according to the culture of your audience. Cultures tend to be either applications first, or principles first . For example, Americans tend to be applications first. When you present to them, they want you to dive right into the ‘hows’. How do you apply this concept? What are some examples? They want action steps. People from Germany, Spain and other European countries lean towards being principles first. They want to understand why you came to the conclusions you did and dig into your methodologies first. Imagine that you’ve determined that a business can increase sales by 25 percent if they provide customers with free samples. An applications first audience will want to know what kind of free sample, whether or not they should provide them with every order and how to follow up with customers. A principles first audience will first want to know how you came to your determination. 3. Taxes If you do any significant amount of work for a client in the US, they’re going to send you a 1099. After all, that becomes their proof that they paid you and allows them to deduct that from their taxes. With foreign clients, you may never receive any sort of tax documents. This doesn’t relieve you of any tax obligations. You are still responsible for reporting your income. To be certain your records are correct, you should contact all foreign clients to double check your numbers. Once you know this, you can do the work of figuring out what you might owe. You can also see if you qualify for the foreign earned income tax exclusion . This covers some cases where you may be able to leave income off […]
