U.K. To USA.invoicing .

**TheCyclingProgrammer** · 18 January 2019, 09:58

Not enough information but I suspect this might be to do with withholding tax. Are you invoicing through a Ltd company? You may need to fill out a W-8BEN.

**jamesbrown** · 19 January 2019, 02:13

Yes, they're looking for Taxpayer Identification Number from the IRS (in the form of an Employer Identification Number).

There should be no withholding requirement and, crucially, no reporting requirement if the income is non-U.S. source income (income associated with work you have physically performed outside the U.S.) of a non-U.S. person (YourCo, which is not a U.S. company). For that reason, you may be able to persuade them that they don't need a TIN or a completed W8-BEN-E (E = Enterprise, i.e. not personal). However, they may insist on both, and it's actually quite easy to get a TIN by calling the IRS. You may have to wait on the phone for 30 mins and it may take 15 mins to get the TIN as they take your details and complete the form for you. You'll need to be very clear that you're requesting a TIN/EIN as a foreign company with no U.S. presence (I assume that is correct) - it may take them a while to understand and put you through to the right person, but you should get a TIN at the end.

That being said, the IRS is impacted by the U.S. gov't shutdown at present, so you'll probably need to wait. Again, you should be able to avoid all this, but it just depends whether the procurement dept you're working with are willing to listen or they insist on following what they believe to be the correct procedure (i.e. computer says no).

See here w/r to an EIN, scroll down to the bottom (phone number provided at the very end):

Taxpayer Identification Numbers TIN | Internal Revenue Service

U.K. To USA.invoicing .