Working remotely for UK company with golden visa

Move to Spain full-time!  There is much more sunshine here than in the UK!  What are you waiting for?  Better lifestyle, much less expensive and much safer!  🍾

If you're employed outside of Spain and spend less than 183 days in Spain, you're exempt from Spanish tax.  I'm not sure what the issue is.  You want to spend more time in Spain?

@petersteel

@petersteel

If you live and work in the UK, then you're  a UK tax resident. You'd need to check on the conditions for giving up UK tax residence, in the future. As @gjpn said, if you've been spending less than 183 days per year in Spain, then you have not acquired Spanish tax residence  (probably, there are other conditions apart from time).

To me, option 1 (continue as a UK employee of your current employer) seems like the easiest and most sensible option. I don't see any issue with doing this, and I don't understand why your employer sees it as a problem (although, personally, I probably wouldn't even have mentioned it, and they'd still have my UK address and contact info). Further, I'm not sure you even need to make any Spanish declaration of your income as long as you are paying your tax and NI in the UK.

It seems like a LOT of money to tie up in a property (for a Golden Visa) if you only live there for a few months a year. But if you're happy with the situation (and your employer doesn't mind you being remote for some months), you should be able to continue like this for many years. You should also be able to renew your visa as necessary, and, after 5 years-ish you should be able to get your permanent residence.

The only complication I see is access to healthcare as you have the right to use the NHS in the UK by virtue of your employment and NI contributions. If you're happy to pay private insurance in Spain, that would be the easiest option. You can also get an EHIC/GHIC from the UK (free) which will work in Spain for emergency treatment. Alternatively, you can probably pay into the Spanish public system via Convenio Especial for about 60 euros per month.

At some point in the future, you could choose to change your status with your employer by having a Spanish company (and being its employee) or becoming an Autonomo (self employed). You would then invoice your employer and they would pay your salary gross, and you make appropriate deductions/declarations in Spain.

Sorry i made an error in the first post. It should say I NOW spend more than 6 months in Spain. Do my original suggestions make more sense now?

is my UK employee likely to be ok with me being self employed? i know HMRC do not like UK tax payers acting as self employed when they should be PAYE, but maybe not an issue for non uk tax resident?

if I go the autonomo route would i have to charge VAT?