Register a business retrospectively?
In principle, you have to register your business at the time you start operating and generate business income from it. If you register retrospectively, you may face a fine, but in practice a certain margin of tolerance has been established. Find out here how to behave properly as a business start-up.
Who has to register a business?
- As a rough rule of thumb, anyone who is self-employed does not freelancer is to register a business. The group of freelancers, such as doctors, lawyers, tax consultants, journalists etc., stands out characterized by the fact that it mainly provides intellectual performance that requires a high level of professional qualification require. If, on the other hand, you generate income from sales, brokerage, crafts or services without professional qualifications, you are a professional.
- But even as a freelancer, you can easily slip into an area that requires registration, for example if you, as a blogger or journalist, earn commissions with your website. In case you can foresee that such income, strictly speaking, does not come from your freelance work If the activity originates in the long run, it is best to speak to your partner Tax office.
- On the other hand, you do not have to register a business if you only make one-off or occasional sales, for example selling furniture or a car.
- Only when you are "sustainably" active, that is, have your company set up for the long term and act with the intention of making a profit, will it become a trade.
- While only a few trades require separate approval, such as the restaurant or the Passenger transport, in most cases simply registering with the local trade office with your submission is sufficient Identity card.
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Special features of the retrospective registration
- As a start-up, you will likely only have expenses for some time before you start earning your first income. In principle, you still have to register the trade when you start working.
- The early registration can also have favorable tax effects for you, because you can then offset the sales tax on your expenses against the tax on your income. So you get the sales tax back on your initial expenses quickly. The input tax deduction can be claimed retrospectively up to three months before the specified date of business start-up.
- However, if you let the registration loop, you should do it retrospectively within three months in order not to incur a fine. The municipal practice is not uniform, but if you go to the trade office yourself, no sanctions will be regularly imposed on you if you have such a slight delay.
It may also be worthwhile for you to register in the period around the turn of the year deliberately waiting until the new year to cover the bookkeeping for an almost expired year save. However, you may only make use of this option if you actually had no or only very little income in the past year.
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