Italian bureaucracy is infamously opaque. The vague and often contradictory nature of rules here lends itself to rumor – particularly among foreigners, who frequently rely on word of mouth to grapple with procedures.
And many Italian processes can be genuinely confusing: perhaps none more so than getting the partita Iva, the tax ID required of freelancers and the self-employed.
READ ALSO: Everything you need to know about getting Italy’s partita IVA
Though you may have heard from friends, colleagues, blogs or social media posts that you don’t need a partita Iva if your income is below a certain amount, the reality is far more complicated.
Whether you are legally required to open a partita Iva has nothing to do with the amount of money you earn. It all comes down to the frequency of your work – and whether it is classed as routine or ‘occasional’ work.
“This [topic] is very complicated,” says tax and finance expert Nicolò Bolla of Accounting Bolla. “However, the key thing here is the concept of habitual or occasional.”
An ‘occasional’ work activity is defined by its inconsistency. It’s something done only periodically, or even just one time.
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“Normally you’d consider it [occasional] if you do it for less than 30 days, even non-consecutive, in a tax year,” Bolla tells The Local.
Take for example the situation of being hired as a freelance translator.
“Let’s say you speak English and Italian, and I hire you as a translator and give you €500 for the day. That activity is definitely occasional – I just hired you for the day,” Bolla explains.
“But if I paid you €10 a day for an entire year to do translations, you’d still fall below €5,000, but the activity is no longer occasional, because you’re doing it every day.”
In other words, anyone regularly working on a freelance or self-employed basis in Italy needs a partita IVA, regardless of whether they make more or less than €5,000 a year.
For more information on how Italian tax rules may apply in your personal circumstances, consult Italy's revenue agency (Agenzie delle Entrate) or a qualified tax professional.
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