Social Security Contributions LTD Company
Oct 2nd 2020, 3:01 pm
#1
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Joined: Oct 2020
Posts: 2
Social Security Contributions LTD Company
Hello everyone I have a question that I simply cannot find the answer to and my accountant is not much help either.
I created a limited company in November 2019 (an EURL status). I have been working non-stop since inception and have been paying myself a salary. From what I can gather, I need to take the amount I have paid myself and then calculate 43% of this value and keep it aside to pay my social security contributions. This part seems fairly clear. It seems that I do not have to pay this until march next year.
I am currently planning on moving back permanently to the UK and closing down my EURL so that I can live closer to my family. This would be before march.
The question that I have, am I still liable to pay that 43% if I leave before payment is due? The way I see it is that I will be paying for a service that I won't be using at time of payment. As I understand it I currently have access to social care because of the money I paid before I went freelance. Is this correct?
Does anybody have any experience with this type of situation?
I created a limited company in November 2019 (an EURL status). I have been working non-stop since inception and have been paying myself a salary. From what I can gather, I need to take the amount I have paid myself and then calculate 43% of this value and keep it aside to pay my social security contributions. This part seems fairly clear. It seems that I do not have to pay this until march next year.
I am currently planning on moving back permanently to the UK and closing down my EURL so that I can live closer to my family. This would be before march.
The question that I have, am I still liable to pay that 43% if I leave before payment is due? The way I see it is that I will be paying for a service that I won't be using at time of payment. As I understand it I currently have access to social care because of the money I paid before I went freelance. Is this correct?
Does anybody have any experience with this type of situation?
Oct 2nd 2020, 4:42 pm
#2
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Joined: Jan 2012
Location: Dépt 61
Posts: 5,254
Re: Social Security Contributions LTD Company
I'm confused.
How did you set the EURL up, are you a TNS or a salarié?
When you say you have been paying yourself a salary, that suggests you are salarié but in that case your company would have registered you with URSSAF as an employee and you (as the company) would have issued yourself (as the employee) with a payslips each month, with deductions taken from your salary and full employer/employee contributions paid to the various agencies.
So presumably you are a TNS (although as a TNS you wouldn't be paying yourself a salary as such).. But I still don't understand how you've been in activity since November 2019 and not paid any cotisations yet. Normally independant workers have to pay their cotisations either monthly or quarterly. It seems very odd that you seem to have gone a whole year earning money and paid no cotisations at all,. Also I'm not sure why they should be due next March, what's special about March?
I think you need to sort this out with URSSAF.
There is a general article here about how cotisations for TNS work, it's not specifically about EURLs but AFAIK it's the same for all gérants non salariés https://www.lecoindesentrepreneurs.f...but-dactivite/
Alternatively, is it possible that you are salarié, and your accountant has been managing your pay and making the deductions from your salary before paying it to you, so that you have in fact been paying your contributions month by month without realising it? How can your accountant not be much help about something as critically important as this?
Apologies if I'm missing something obvious here but I can't quite figure out what the situation is.
How did you set the EURL up, are you a TNS or a salarié?
When you say you have been paying yourself a salary, that suggests you are salarié but in that case your company would have registered you with URSSAF as an employee and you (as the company) would have issued yourself (as the employee) with a payslips each month, with deductions taken from your salary and full employer/employee contributions paid to the various agencies.
So presumably you are a TNS (although as a TNS you wouldn't be paying yourself a salary as such).. But I still don't understand how you've been in activity since November 2019 and not paid any cotisations yet. Normally independant workers have to pay their cotisations either monthly or quarterly. It seems very odd that you seem to have gone a whole year earning money and paid no cotisations at all,. Also I'm not sure why they should be due next March, what's special about March?
I think you need to sort this out with URSSAF.
There is a general article here about how cotisations for TNS work, it's not specifically about EURLs but AFAIK it's the same for all gérants non salariés https://www.lecoindesentrepreneurs.f...but-dactivite/
Alternatively, is it possible that you are salarié, and your accountant has been managing your pay and making the deductions from your salary before paying it to you, so that you have in fact been paying your contributions month by month without realising it? How can your accountant not be much help about something as critically important as this?
Apologies if I'm missing something obvious here but I can't quite figure out what the situation is.
Last edited by EuroTrash; Oct 2nd 2020 at 4:50 pm.
Oct 2nd 2020, 6:21 pm
#3
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Joined: Apr 2008
Location: Hérault (34)
Posts: 8,890
Re: Social Security Contributions LTD Company
I'm confused.
How did you set the EURL up, are you a TNS or a salarié?
When you say you have been paying yourself a salary, that suggests you are salarié but in that case your company would have registered you with URSSAF as an employee and you (as the company) would have issued yourself (as the employee) with a payslips each month, with deductions taken from your salary and full employer/employee contributions paid to the various agencies.
So presumably you are a TNS (although as a TNS you wouldn't be paying yourself a salary as such).. But I still don't understand how you've been in activity since November 2019 and not paid any cotisations yet. Normally independant workers have to pay their cotisations either monthly or quarterly. It seems very odd that you seem to have gone a whole year earning money and paid no cotisations at all,. Also I'm not sure why they should be due next March, what's special about March?
I think you need to sort this out with URSSAF.
There is a general article here about how cotisations for TNS work, it's not specifically about EURLs but AFAIK it's the same for all gérants non salariés https://www.lecoindesentrepreneurs.f...but-dactivite/
Alternatively, is it possible that you are salarié, and your accountant has been managing your pay and making the deductions from your salary before paying it to you, so that you have in fact been paying your contributions month by month without realising it? How can your accountant not be much help about something as critically important as this?
Apologies if I'm missing something obvious here but I can't quite figure out what the situation is.
How did you set the EURL up, are you a TNS or a salarié?
When you say you have been paying yourself a salary, that suggests you are salarié but in that case your company would have registered you with URSSAF as an employee and you (as the company) would have issued yourself (as the employee) with a payslips each month, with deductions taken from your salary and full employer/employee contributions paid to the various agencies.
So presumably you are a TNS (although as a TNS you wouldn't be paying yourself a salary as such).. But I still don't understand how you've been in activity since November 2019 and not paid any cotisations yet. Normally independant workers have to pay their cotisations either monthly or quarterly. It seems very odd that you seem to have gone a whole year earning money and paid no cotisations at all,. Also I'm not sure why they should be due next March, what's special about March?
I think you need to sort this out with URSSAF.
There is a general article here about how cotisations for TNS work, it's not specifically about EURLs but AFAIK it's the same for all gérants non salariés https://www.lecoindesentrepreneurs.f...but-dactivite/
Alternatively, is it possible that you are salarié, and your accountant has been managing your pay and making the deductions from your salary before paying it to you, so that you have in fact been paying your contributions month by month without realising it? How can your accountant not be much help about something as critically important as this?
Apologies if I'm missing something obvious here but I can't quite figure out what the situation is.
As you suggest, he must contact the URSSAF.
I don't understand why the accountant hasn't given him payslips or statements listing all the côtisations deducted, whatever his status. And an accountant who doesn't pay côtisations for his client is an odd one....
Oct 3rd 2020, 9:22 am
#4
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Joined: Sep 2019
Posts: 654
Re: Social Security Contributions LTD Company
Well I crossed paths with an accountant who did just that It did not affect me directly only from the point of view that she took money to submit a tax return and did not do it Luckily I got my money back but then quite a few expats came out of the woodwork to complain about her She had not been paying her employees SS contributions either and eventually did a bunk back to the UK I suggest that the OP look very carefully at what is going on especially if this accountant is a UK based female......
Oct 3rd 2020, 10:44 am
#5
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Joined: Oct 2020
Posts: 2
Re: Social Security Contributions LTD Company
Hi thanks for the response
I guess I'm TNS I'm not sure.
Basically I have a company (an EURL) and this EURL has a bank account. I have a contract with my clients (software developer) which says you pay me X amount per day. At the end of the month I send them a bill and then they pay the facture into the bank account of my EURL.
I then login to my EURL bank account and say "oh I fancy 1000 this month" and do a bank transfer from my EURL bank account to my own bank account. It is on this amount that I have to pay 43 or 35 or whatever percent to URSAAF.
I have been sent various things from URSAAF throughout this year and I believe the end of last, where they kind of estimate and say that I owe X amount. So I have been paying this. If I understand correctly next year is my 2nd year of activity which is when I send them the real numbers (this is vastly higher than they estimated by a factor of at least 2 I'd say).
So the question is, when I have to send them the actual figures what happens if the EURL is shut and I've left the country?
It's quite confusing I undsestand I can clarify more points if you want
I guess I'm TNS I'm not sure.
Basically I have a company (an EURL) and this EURL has a bank account. I have a contract with my clients (software developer) which says you pay me X amount per day. At the end of the month I send them a bill and then they pay the facture into the bank account of my EURL.
I then login to my EURL bank account and say "oh I fancy 1000 this month" and do a bank transfer from my EURL bank account to my own bank account. It is on this amount that I have to pay 43 or 35 or whatever percent to URSAAF.
I have been sent various things from URSAAF throughout this year and I believe the end of last, where they kind of estimate and say that I owe X amount. So I have been paying this. If I understand correctly next year is my 2nd year of activity which is when I send them the real numbers (this is vastly higher than they estimated by a factor of at least 2 I'd say).
So the question is, when I have to send them the actual figures what happens if the EURL is shut and I've left the country?
It's quite confusing I undsestand I can clarify more points if you want
Oct 3rd 2020, 11:22 am
#6
Lost in BE Cyberspace
Joined: Jan 2012
Location: Dépt 61
Posts: 5,254
Re: Social Security Contributions LTD Company
Hi thanks for the response
I guess I'm TNS I'm not sure.
Basically I have a company (an EURL) and this EURL has a bank account. I have a contract with my clients (software developer) which says you pay me X amount per day. At the end of the month I send them a bill and then they pay the facture into the bank account of my EURL.
I then login to my EURL bank account and say "oh I fancy 1000 this month" and do a bank transfer from my EURL bank account to my own bank account. It is on this amount that I have to pay 43 or 35 or whatever percent to URSAAF.
I don't think it is.
If you're salaried, then cotisations are paid on your salary. The money that the company makes over and above what it pays out in salaries, is kept separate.
If you're non salaried, then cotisations are paid on the profits you make. It's all earned income, whether it's in the business bank account or in your own. You don't have a fixed "salary" and there's no partition between "your" money and the company's money - as you say, it's all your money, and you can decide how much to leave in the business bank account and how much to transfer to your personal account.. It's basically all the same money and you pay cotisations on all of it, at a lower rate than you would pay on a salary, and these are the invoices you've been paying.
That's why the first thing to clarify is whether you're TNS or salarié because it is two totally different things.
I have been sent various things from URSAAF throughout this year and I believe the end of last, where they kind of estimate and say that I owe X amount. So I have been paying this. If I understand correctly next year is my 2nd year of activity which is when I send them the real numbers (this is vastly higher than they estimated by a factor of at least 2 I'd say).
Yes that is correct. The first year you pay minimum cotisations, because your actual income isn't known, and after that the amount due will be calculated on the actual figures.
It's the payments you have been making, that have entitled you to healthcare while you've been in business. Not, as you suggested in your first post, the money you paid in previously, before you set up your own business.
So the question is, when I have to send them the actual figures what happens if the EURL is shut and I've left the country?
Yes you do, because if you have been underpaying during the first year you will need to pay the balance.
Cotisations are levied as a fixed percentage of income, and the fact you've actually been paying less than your share because it was based on estimates, doesn't change the amount that is in fact due.
Think of it as an electricity bill. If you paid bills based on estimates for a year, after which you moved house, and it turned out from the final meter reading that you'd used more electricity than you'd paid for, you wouldn't argue that you shouldn't need to pay the outstanding amount because you'd left the country, would you?
It's quite confusing I undsestand I can clarify more points if you want
I guess I'm TNS I'm not sure.
Basically I have a company (an EURL) and this EURL has a bank account. I have a contract with my clients (software developer) which says you pay me X amount per day. At the end of the month I send them a bill and then they pay the facture into the bank account of my EURL.
I then login to my EURL bank account and say "oh I fancy 1000 this month" and do a bank transfer from my EURL bank account to my own bank account. It is on this amount that I have to pay 43 or 35 or whatever percent to URSAAF.
I don't think it is.
If you're salaried, then cotisations are paid on your salary. The money that the company makes over and above what it pays out in salaries, is kept separate.
If you're non salaried, then cotisations are paid on the profits you make. It's all earned income, whether it's in the business bank account or in your own. You don't have a fixed "salary" and there's no partition between "your" money and the company's money - as you say, it's all your money, and you can decide how much to leave in the business bank account and how much to transfer to your personal account.. It's basically all the same money and you pay cotisations on all of it, at a lower rate than you would pay on a salary, and these are the invoices you've been paying.
That's why the first thing to clarify is whether you're TNS or salarié because it is two totally different things.
I have been sent various things from URSAAF throughout this year and I believe the end of last, where they kind of estimate and say that I owe X amount. So I have been paying this. If I understand correctly next year is my 2nd year of activity which is when I send them the real numbers (this is vastly higher than they estimated by a factor of at least 2 I'd say).
Yes that is correct. The first year you pay minimum cotisations, because your actual income isn't known, and after that the amount due will be calculated on the actual figures.
It's the payments you have been making, that have entitled you to healthcare while you've been in business. Not, as you suggested in your first post, the money you paid in previously, before you set up your own business.
So the question is, when I have to send them the actual figures what happens if the EURL is shut and I've left the country?
Yes you do, because if you have been underpaying during the first year you will need to pay the balance.
Cotisations are levied as a fixed percentage of income, and the fact you've actually been paying less than your share because it was based on estimates, doesn't change the amount that is in fact due.
Think of it as an electricity bill. If you paid bills based on estimates for a year, after which you moved house, and it turned out from the final meter reading that you'd used more electricity than you'd paid for, you wouldn't argue that you shouldn't need to pay the outstanding amount because you'd left the country, would you?
It's quite confusing I undsestand I can clarify more points if you want
So it will just be a case of paying the difference between the estimated amounts that you've already paid, and the actual amount that URSSAF will calculate when they have the figures.
When you close the EURL and leave the country France won't instantly forget about you, there will be various things to tidy up. You'll still have to submit your income declaration for calendar year 2020 to the tax people next May, and if you close the business during 2021 you'll also have your 2021 income to declare in May 2022, that's a legal obligation. Also if you leave after December you'll potentially have property taxes to pay. So there is no immediate escape from the tax office or URSSAF I'm afraid, they will know where you live, but they won't ask you to give them 43% of everything you've transferred from the business account to your personal account so hopefully you are quite a bit richer than you thought
Hope that helps.
Oct 3rd 2020, 12:48 pm
#7
Lost in BE Cyberspace
Joined: Apr 2008
Location: Hérault (34)
Posts: 8,890
Re: Social Security Contributions LTD Company
However the good news is that you don't have to pay any separate cotisations on the money you've been looking at as your "salary". You've already paid cotisations on it, that's what the bills were for.
So it will just be a case of paying the difference between the estimated amounts that you've already paid, and the actual amount that URSSAF will calculate when they have the figures.
When you close the EURL and leave the country France won't instantly forget about you, there will be various things to tidy up. You'll still have to submit your income declaration for calendar year 2020 to the tax people next May, and if you close the business during 2021 you'll also have your 2021 income to declare in May 2022, that's a legal obligation. Also if you leave after December you'll potentially have property taxes to pay. So there is no immediate escape from the tax office or URSSAF I'm afraid, they will know where you live, but they won't ask you to give them 43% of everything you've transferred from the business account to your personal account so hopefully you are quite a bit richer than you thought
Hope that helps.
So it will just be a case of paying the difference between the estimated amounts that you've already paid, and the actual amount that URSSAF will calculate when they have the figures.
When you close the EURL and leave the country France won't instantly forget about you, there will be various things to tidy up. You'll still have to submit your income declaration for calendar year 2020 to the tax people next May, and if you close the business during 2021 you'll also have your 2021 income to declare in May 2022, that's a legal obligation. Also if you leave after December you'll potentially have property taxes to pay. So there is no immediate escape from the tax office or URSSAF I'm afraid, they will know where you live, but they won't ask you to give them 43% of everything you've transferred from the business account to your personal account so hopefully you are quite a bit richer than you thought
Hope that helps.
