| gettyimagesbank |
By Yoon Ja-young
Wage-earning foreign workers should settle year-end taxes just like Korean workers, the tax agency said Wednesday. The agency is providing various materials to support them in filing their taxes, including a short video guide with English, Chinese and Vietnamese subtitles.
According to the National Tax Service (NTS), all foreign employees should settle year-end taxes for 2022 the same way as Korean employees no later than the date on which wages for February this year are paid.
They can submit their report of income deduction and tax credit as well as supporting documents to their employer, instead of directly to the tax office. Based on the finalized income tax for their wages and salaries received over the past year, employees will either pay more income tax or receive a tax rebate for overpaid income taxes during the past year.
The NTS noted that there are special taxation regulations that apply only to foreigners, such as the application of the 19 percent flat tax rate, an income reduction and an exemption for foreign engineers.
However, because foreign residents do not qualify as the head of a household in accordance with the Resident Registration Act, they are not eligible for an income deduction for savings in housing purchases among housing-related deductions, it added.
The number of foreign workers who settled their year-end taxes has been increasing between 2017 and 2019, but dropped 7.3 percent to 505,000 in 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the amount of year-end taxes reported by foreign employees increased 12.2 percent to 1.08 trillion won.
Among foreign employees who filed year-end tax settlements last year, 37.5 percent were Chinese nationals, followed by Vietnamese at 8.1 percent, Nepalese at 5.5 percent, Americans at 4.9 percent and Cambodians at 4.6 percent.
The tax agency added that it provides information to foreigners through various channels to make it more convenient for foreign workers to settle their year-end taxes. They can check the “Easy Guide to Year-end Tax Settlement” provided on the NTS English website or call the NTS English hotline for foreign taxpayers at 1588-0560, for more detailed information on year-end tax settlements.
This year, the agency also started providing a short video guide to the year-end tax settlement, available with English, Chinese and Vietnamese subtitles, through YouTube and the NTS English website.
“We will continue to further improve the year-end tax settlement filing and support system for foreign workers,” the NTS noted.