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donderdag 26 mei 2011

Red Tape Time

So after the hype of Eurovision and Pride in Brussels (which was fab by the way - I, along with my mates, even made the news), another glorious aspect of Belgium has come along to slap me in the face and kick me in the bollocks. However, this is not just something that is designed to annoy foreigners, for it is the joyous occasion that the majority of Belgians or those living in Belgium will come to experience - that fat arse brown envelope that sits like a black hole in your postbox ready to suck away the last bit of joy in your life.

In case no-one got what I meant (which is probably most non-Belgians), I got my tax-return forms in the post today.

It literally made me want to up sticks and bugger off back to the UK. There's this big-arse booklet to "help" you through the forms (there aren't inverted commas in the world big enough, I'm afraid, to express the sarcasm I'm trying to convey in the word "help"), and then another booklet to give you the CODES you need to fill into your form for different sections.

WHATEVER HAPPENED TO A "TICK THE BOX" FORM???????

I haven't started it yet, and I'm not sure I ever will. Suicide seems more appealing, and more likely.  For the moment, I'm going to wait until Nathalie comes back from her holiday (yes I am jealous, even though she's in Tunisia, at a beach resort somewhere no doubt sipping cocktails, with the faint echos of small arms fire in the background) so she can help me through it. Yes, it's all in Dutch too.

AND, I'm not sure if I'm missing some pay slips from last year as I moved to Brussels in December and I forgot to contact my old landlord to ask him to save my post. I hope he has, otherwise I simply do not want to know how many forms I need to fill in extra, nor how many stamps I will need from however many companies/people/entities/abstract Belgian concepts that have to be summoned one way or another.

Please Belgium, adopt PAYE (Pay As You Earn). It works so well(ish) in the UK and there is so much less paperwork and stress.

If I ever make it to the other side, I will let you know.

2 opmerkingen:

  1. I'm on PAYE here in Switzerland, but only because I'm a foreigner. They don't trust us to do it at the end of the year...

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  2. They actually do PAYE here too, but you have to do your own tax return to see if it matches with their version of how much you should be taxed. If they've taxed too much or you've paid too little, you get a bill to pay, or they pay you back (in theory), respectively.

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