Can someone help me please with a witholding tax reclaim via 210

I am a UK resident 

Spain has deducted 19.5%witholding tax on my Santander and IAG shares when its supposed to only be 10%)

ts impossible to get access to spanish tax agency website because all the search engines block access and say its unsafe 

I have info from HMRC and a load if hyperlinks but they dont work either ...battling that ine with HMRC 

I am being told i have to make an appt and  somehow travel to London to get an NIE number and then return 2 weeks later to obtain a digital certificate and then somehow struggle with form 210 and creating a pdf 

It seems that Spain has erected a huge wall of beurocracy to avoid honouring the double taxation treaty requirements

Even the form to get an NIE is a nightmare and i really cant get to london 

Can anyone help please 

You are not the first to post on here about this subject. I do not have the exact answer you are possibly looking for.

Questions you may well want to ask yourself:-

Are you purposely being legal scammed?

How much financially are you loosing in this situation?

Is it worth all the stress to try and sort it out?

EOS members may be able to advise, but do you need a tax professional or solicitor/lawyer to sort this out and at what cost?

How many hoops are you prepared to jump through and at what cost to get how much, or might you be flogging a dead horse?

I wish you all the luck, but sometimes in life you get done up like a kipper ‘’legally’’. So much for regulation and consumer protection.

Gee thanks ....clearly Spain is totally corrupt 

Hello Despair

Every country is corrupt to a degree with the exception of the UK.

Hospital car parking, TV license, Airport drop offs, Branded paracetamol, Online booking fees, parking in major cities, and some too sensitive to mention.

Theres corruption and corruption ....in this case they are deliberately flouting a clause in Double Taxation Treaty they signed and in my shoes given what low interest rates have done to my paltry pension income since 2008 the what to you might be a small amount is actually an awful lot of money to me .......i bet no Spanish Citizen is faced with same scenario with our HMRC 

Thank you ....its the fact that i would have to go to London with that form to then receive an NIE number some 2 weeks later  and then go back to London to get a personal Digital Certificate and somehow then produce a 210 and a pdf    thats bugging me .....i cant afford 2 trips to London and its not supposed to be nessecary 

Spain has apparently put up walls and is thus preventing use of Dusl Taxation Treaty to recover the excess Witholding Tax on Share Dividends thats bugging me ...HMRC instructions insist i can simply reclaim via post 

If everything you say is correct then you should go to your local member of parliament in despair and ask them to sort it out, it is their duty to serve their constituents free of charge. Please let us all know what your MP says and does.

Two thoughts on this Despair.

1) IAG has detailed guidance notes on its website and suggest a Spanish  Tax Form company in its instructions. Here for Uk residents. Are you saying this does not work

https://www.iairgroup.com/~/media/Files/I/IAG/documents/shareholder-information-pdf/spanish-tax-informatio-on-dividends-for-iag-uk-resident-shareholders.pdf

2) Depending on your tax status you may be able to offset the tax deducted on dividend agains your allowance of £2000 for dividend payments, so the net effect is zero. I do this for US share holdings.

Saludos

I am aware of both IAG and Santander notes  and indeed both Spanish Tax Forms and Gesmingot both of whom have stopped trying to file claims for UK citizens ..and no one else does it 

Since i do not come close to paying tax on partial state pension plus pathetic interest on savings and equally low dividends cant offset anything either ......Hence why i need to reclaim the 9.5% WHT that Spain have illegally deducted on dividends on shares i have held long long before Spain was involved

Equally the sheer cost of getting to London not once but twice and the £8.50 NIE fee is simply beyond my budget 

HMRC have also issued a string of instructions and links which may have worked in 2014 but sure as heck do not now

Despair  Have you thought about coming to Spain and getting a Spanish Fiscal rep like most people do  ¿, being Autonomis we would not dream of doing such complex paper work ourselves, 

Hello Mrs Despair

It is difficult to help a plea from an OP ‘’ Can anyone help please ‘’ when they have more in-depth knowledge than forum members. What answers are you actually expecting to this subject? Under EU regulation there are complaints procedures that are available to all consumers. Use them or continue moaning about the situation you have chosen to get yourself into.  

EU rules do please enlighten me about them or where i find them   ....i have tried resesrching all of this thing about Spain and WHTax  but its not easy and when your budget is tight thanks to effects of Low Interest rates since financial crisis of 2008 every penny counts 

As for flying to Spain and getting an expert to deal with it ...thats way out of my budget ....

I think angeleyes1 may have a point: unless there happens to be another non-resident forum member who receives dividends from Spanish shares, the chances are you already know more about this subject than anyone else here.

Are you sure your first statement, for example, "Spain has deducted 19.5% witholding tax....when its supposed to only be 10%", is correct? Where does this information come from? I just did a quick search on the Spanish tax office website (I'm currently in the UK, no problem accessing it at all, so maybe you need to look at your security settings), and it would appear to me that dividends should be taxed at 19%. I confess to knowing virtually nothing about double taxation treaties, but my understanding is that they are designed to avoid you paying tax twice on the same income. So unless HMRC are taxing you as well on your dividends, I'm not entirely sure what the issue is. 

On the second part of your original post, who exactly is telling you that you have to travel to London and obtain an NIE & digital certificate? And why?

Finally, and at the risk of being accused of being sarcastic, which is not my intention - have you considered simply selling these shares and reinvesting in UK shares or funds? I appreciate that may be an inconvenience (and unwanted expense), but it may be easier than negotiating Spanish bureaucracy.

Current years WHTax may be 19% but previous years are 19.5% .....

And part of the double taxation treaty inc the one with Spain says that no more than 10% can be retained by spain and we can indeed request a refund of the difference 

I am intrigued as to how you were able to access their website as neither I or my friends can when they have tried 

I have found out their personal digital certificates only work with a very old version of firefox 

I am considering selling the shares but when this Brexit mess is over 

Hence why i sure do not need all the costs of going back and forth to London twice 

One thing is certain i would not want to own property in Spain by look of this carry on 

Like I said, you probably know more about this topic than anyone else here is likely to - but the page I found shows the rate of 19% applicable from 2016 onwards.

The page I'm looking at is here. Unlike many official Spanish websites which are outdated and "not secure", this one appears to be fine. I have no idea why you are having difficulty accessing it. (I've checked it in Chrome, FF & MS Edge)

As for the double taxation treaty and reclaiming any excess withholding tax, again, you obviously know far more about this than I do, but I still am curious to know from whom you received your information. Did HMRC advise you to apply for an NIE?

If you are considering selling the shares, I wonder why Brexit is making you delay? When / if it ever happens, as a subsequent  non-EU citizen, you could well find yourself treated even more unfairly by the Spansih authorities. For a start, if they decide that any capital gains tax is due on the sale, they will almost certainly apply a higher rate than if you were still an EU citizen. I think if it was me, I'd want to shift them sooner rather than later. Just a thought?

And just my personal opinion, but I think you're very sensible not wanting to own property in Spain. They certainly don't tell you the whole story on A Place in the Sun!

(Sorry I can't be of more practical help)

Well i certainly wont make a Capitol gain if i sell thats for sure ...more like a large loss 

HMRC are well aware of the issue but refuse to face it currently 

HMRC sent me a whole load of links and info but they are out of date and will not work and instead of facing the issue 

They suggest i file a MAP complaint which will mean talks at International level and take months 

The NIE info has come direct from Spanish Embassy 

If i try your link i get same message ...."website cannot provide a secure link "  hence i can only conclude their site is considered unsafe 

Sorry to hear you're in a loss position. Know the feeling :-(

I'm not sure HMRC are responsible for the Spanish authority's actions.

I wonder if the Spanish embassy understood (or cared) about your dilemna?

The website is secure (https). Maybe your antivirus is preventing you accessing it for some reason.

What monetary value is involved here? Pounds, shillings and pence?

Never said HMRC are responsible for Spanish brick walls of beurocracy they seem to have been instituted recently and HMRC are behind the curve 

Its David Gauke et al who signed these treaties without any attention to detail or the bottom line of officialdom and thats where a MAP complaint is directed 

Its a principal as much as the monetary value of the 9% which is only around £30  but when budgets are tight thanks to last 10 years of meddling with interest rates by B of E and the abject failure of triple lock on State pension to even touch actual increase in basic cost of living one cannot ignore anything your legitimately owed 

I am lost as to why if you say the site is OK i get endless messages saying its not ...is BT  that brilliant at blocking dodgy sites ?           Need to find out if one can actually post a reclaim if i could get a 210 form and submit without an NIE