Tag Archives: Cross-Border Service Fees

Labour Dispatch / 劳务派遣, Tax Compliance / 税务合规

VAT Withholding When the Seller Is Abroad and the Team Is Onshore

  • Services supplied inside China by Overseas Individuals make the buyer the VAT Withholding Agent under Article 15 of the VAT Law, a rule that predates the 2026 announcement.
    境外个人在境内提供服务的，购买方依《增值税法》第十五条成为增值税扣缴义务人；这是既有规则，早于 2026 年的公告。
  • The rate applied to a service supplied inside China by an overseas individual is 6 per cent, and no Urban Maintenance and Construction Tax is levied on that VAT.
    境外个人在境内提供服务适用 6% 税率，且对其缴纳的增值税不征收城市维护建设税。
  • Announcement No. 28 of 2026 builds a withholding system for domestic natural persons; it does not create the buyer’s obligation towards an overseas seller.
    2026 年第 28 号公告建立的是境内自然人的扣缴制度，并没有创设购买方对境外销售方的扣缴义务。
  • Where the seller sits abroad and the team sits onshore, who pays the fee decides the chain: a payer inside China withholds, a payer outside China follows a different route.
    卖方在境外、团队在境内时，由谁付款决定链条：付款方在境内则代扣，付款方在境外则走另一条路径。
  • Cross-Border Service Fees should be contracted on a tax-inclusive basis, because the withholding is computed on the amount paid and cannot be recovered from a clause.
    跨境服务费应按含税口径签约，因为扣缴按实付金额计算，无法靠合同条款追回。
  • Between 1 January and 31 October 2026 the natural person still self-declares; the withholding route under Announcement No. 28 starts on 1 November 2026.
    2026 年 1 月 1 日至 10 月 31 日发生的应税交易仍由自然人自行申报；28 号公告的扣缴路径自 2026 年 11 月 1 日起适用。

VAT Withholding When the Seller Is Abroad and the Team Is Onshore | 卖方在境外、团队在境内：增值税扣缴由谁做、扣什么、凭证怎么走

Overview

A foreign group runs a project in China with a small onshore team: a country manager, two engineers, a part-time designer paid by the day, and a professor flown in for a two-week training block. Invoices arrive from four different places, and the finance team in Shanghai has to decide, for each one, whether tax is withheld, by whom, at what rate, and against which document.

That decision is often described as a new problem created by the 2026 announcement on withholding VAT from natural persons. It is not. The announcement, effective 1 November 2026, builds a withholding system for domestic natural persons. The obligation that concerns an overseas seller is older, sits in Article 15 of the VAT Law, and has not changed. Confusing the two produces either an over-withholding that the seller disputes or an under-withholding that surfaces at audit.

Three chains, kept apart

Three relationships are routinely conflated. They share vocabulary and share nothing else.

Domestic natural person to domestic buyer. Announcement No. 28 of 2026, effective 1 November 2026. The domestic entity that buys from a natural person becomes the withholding agent for that transaction. This article does not re-describe the mechanics; they are covered separately.

Overseas individual to a buyer inside China. Article 15 of the VAT Law: where an overseas unit or individual carries out a taxable transaction inside China, the purchaser is the VAT withholding agent, unless a domestic agent is appointed to declare and pay under State Council rules. This is a pre-existing rule.

Overseas entity to a buyer inside China. The same Article 15 sentence covers units as well as individuals. What differs is the practical route: a domestic agent may be appointed to declare and pay. The announcement does not set a rate conclusion for a corporate seller, and neither does this article.

Keep the three in separate columns on the same page. Most errors come from applying the mechanics of the first chain to a transaction that belongs in the second.

The overseas individual route

For an individual seller, the position is relatively clean. The service is supplied inside China, the purchaser is the withholding agent, the applicable rate for the service is 6 per cent, and the construction tax does not apply.

Two conditions deserve attention. First, “inside China” is a factual question about where the service is consumed, not about where the contract is signed or where the invoice is issued. A consultant who works remotely from abroad for a Chinese project is a different case from one who delivers workshops in Shanghai, and the file should record which one it is.

Second, the exception is narrow. A domestic agent appointed under State Council rules to declare and pay displaces the purchaser’s withholding role. Absent that appointment, the purchaser holds the obligation, and a contract clause allocating tax to the seller does not move it.

Why the construction tax changes the price

Article 3 of the Urban Maintenance and Construction Tax Law provides that VAT paid by an overseas unit or individual on labour and services sold into China is not subject to the construction tax.

The practical effect is a cost structure that differs from a domestic natural person engagement. On the domestic side, VAT is accompanied by the construction tax and its surcharges, which are calculated by reference to the VAT actually paid. On the overseas individual side, the VAT is there and the construction tax is not. A quote built on the domestic template overstates the add-on; a quote built on “no tax” understates the whole.

For a group negotiating a net fee, this is where the argument actually happens. The gross-up must be calculated on the correct base: 6 per cent on the payment, with no construction tax layer. Getting that wrong by a few points is not a rounding issue on a multi-year consulting arrangement; it is a permanent margin difference.

Contracts, invoices and vouchers

The tax outcome is largely fixed before the invoice is issued.

Decide whether the contract price is tax-inclusive. If the fee is stated net and the withholding falls on the payer, the payer absorbs it, and the budget was wrong from the start.

Decide who issues the invoice. An overseas individual generally cannot issue a Chinese invoice; the withholding certificate becomes the document the payer holds. That certificate is what supports the booking and, where relevant, the deduction position. A file without it is a payment without evidence.

Decide how the payment leaves. A cross-border remittance and an onshore payment run on different rails, with different documentation, and the withholding must be settled on the correct rail. Splitting a single engagement across both rails without a rule is how a clean file becomes a reconciliation problem.

The onshore team question

The same person can be engaged in three ways, and each produces a different withholding position.

Engaged as an individual service provider, the payment is a service fee, and the buyer is the withholding agent under Article 15.

Engaged through a domestic staffing or outsourcing arrangement, the payment is to an entity, and the withholding analysis moves to that entity’s own invoicing.

Employed directly by the Chinese subsidiary, the payment is salary, and the question becomes payroll withholding rather than service withholding.

The engagement label is not decisive; the substance is. A daily-paid designer who works on the company’s systems, on the company’s schedule, for one client looks less like a service provider than the contract says. This article flags the boundary only. The rules on dispatch ratios and social insurance sit elsewhere, and they are not affected by the 2026 announcement.

Practical steps

  • Add a withholding determination to the payment approval flow, before the payment is released rather than after.
  • Separate the two payment channels in the ledger: cross-border remittance and onshore payment, each with its own withholding logic.
  • Record the place of performance for every service engagement, in writing, at the point of contracting.
  • Keep the tax residency status and any treaty position of the individual on file, since both affect the analysis and both take time to evidence.
  • For corporate sellers, confirm whether a domestic agent has been appointed; if it has, the file needs that appointment, not a withholding certificate.

Outlook

Expect the first disputes to concern the place of performance rather than the rate, because the rate for an individual service is settled while the geography is not. Expect scrutiny of arrangements that split one engagement into a cross-border contract and an onshore payment run. The defensible position is documentation created at the time of contracting, not reconstructed at the time of examination.

Related reading

  • *Withholding VAT on Natural Person Service Providers* (Article 502) — the domestic natural person mechanics in full.

Sources

  • 国家税务总局四川省税务局·28 号公告附件《境内单位代扣代缴自然人增值税管理办法》条文问答：https://sichuan.chinatax.gov.cn/art/2026/10/9/art_327_1364961.html
  • 国家税务总局法规库·《中华人民共和国增值税法》及实施条例：https://fgk.chinatax.gov.cn/
  • 国家税务总局甘肃省税务局·扣缴申报时限条文问答：http://gansu.chinatax.gov.cn/art/2026/9/10/art_75_476972.html
  • 财政部·政策发布：https://www.mof.gov.cn/

卖方在境外、团队在境内：增值税扣缴由谁做、扣什么、凭证怎么走

概述

一家外国集团在中国做一个项目，境内只有一支小团队：一名国别经理、两名工程师、一名按日计酬的兼职设计师，再加一位飞来讲两周课的专家。发票从四个地方来，上海的财务要为每一张判断：要不要扣税、由谁扣、按什么税率、凭什么凭证入账。

这件事常被说成 2026 年自然人增值税扣缴公告带来的新问题。并不是。2026 年 11 月 1 日起施行的公告，建立的是境内自然人的扣缴制度。真正涉及境外销售方的那项义务更早，写在《增值税法》第十五条里，这次没有变。把两者混在一起，结果只有两种：要么多扣，销售方来争；要么少扣，检查时才浮现。

三条链条，必须分开

有三种关系经常被混为一谈。它们用同一套词，除此之外没有共同点。

境内自然人对境内购买方。 2026 年第 28 号公告，自 2026 年 11 月 1 日起施行。向自然人购买服务的境内单位，就该笔交易成为扣缴义务人。本文不再复述其机制，另有专文。

境外个人对境内购买方。 《增值税法》第十五条：境外单位或者个人在境内发生应税交易的，购买方为增值税扣缴义务人；按照国务院规定委托境内代理人申报缴纳税款的除外。这是既有规则。

境外单位对境内购买方。 第十五条同一句话既覆盖单位也覆盖个人。不同之处在操作路径：可以委托境内代理人申报缴纳。公告没有就企业销售方给出税率结论，本文也不给。

把三条画成同一页上的三列。多数错误，都是把第一条的机制套到了本该归入第二条的交易上。

境外个人这条路径

对个人销售方而言，位置相对清楚：服务在境内提供，购买方是扣缴义务人，服务适用 6% 税率，城建税不征。

有两个条件值得盯住。第一，”在境内”是关于服务在哪里被消费的事实判断，不是合同在哪里签、发票在哪里开。一位在境外远程为中国项目工作的顾问，与一位在上海现场授课的顾问，是两个案子；卷宗里要写清是哪一个。

第二，除外情形很窄。按国务院规定委托境内代理人申报缴纳，才会替代购买方的扣缴地位。没有这项委托，义务就落在购买方身上，合同里约定由销售方承担税负的条款也搬不动它。

城建税如何改变价格

《城市维护建设税法》第三条规定：境外单位或者个人向境内销售劳务、服务缴纳的增值税，不征收城市维护建设税。

实际效果是，成本结构与境内自然人交易不同。境内这一侧，增值税之外还有以实缴增值税为计税依据的城建税及附加；境外个人这一侧，有增值税，没有城建税。拿境内模板做的报价，会把附加算高；拿”没有税”做的报价，会把整体算低。

对谈净额费用的集团来说，分歧就发生在这里。含税还原要按正确的基数算：按付款额计 6%，不再叠加城建税。差几个百分点，放在多年期顾问安排上不是四舍五入的问题，而是永久的毛利差。

合同、发票与凭证

税务结果，很大程度上在开票之前就定了。

先定合同价款是否含税。若约定净额、扣缴落在付款方，就是付款方吸收，预算从一开始就错了。

再定发票由谁开。境外个人通常无法开具中国发票，付款方手上留下的是扣缴凭证。入账靠它；涉及税前扣除的，也靠它。没有这份凭证，就是一笔没有证据的付款。

还要定钱怎么出去。跨境付汇与境内付款走的是两条通道，单据不同，扣缴必须在正确的那条通道上结清。同一项业务拆到两条通道却没有规则，干净的一笔账就会变成对账难题。

在岸团队这一问

同一个人，可以三种方式合作，扣缴位置各不相同。

按个人服务提供者结算，付款是服务费，购买方依第十五条成为扣缴义务人。

通过境内劳务派遣或外包安排结算，付款对象是单位，扣缴分析转到该单位自己的开票环节。

由境内子公司直接雇佣，付款是工资，问题就从服务扣缴变成工资薪金的扣缴。

名义不决定性质，实质才决定。一位按日计酬的设计师，用公司的系统、按公司的排期、只服务一个客户，看起来就不像合同上写的那样是服务提供者。本文只标出这条边界；派遣比例与社保规则另有专文，也不因 2026 年的公告而改变。

落地步骤

  • 在付款审批流里加一个”扣缴判定”节点，放在放款之前，而不是之后。
  • 账上把两条付款通道分开：跨境付汇与境内付款，各自一套扣缴逻辑。
  • 每一项服务合作，在签约时以书面记录实际履行地。
  • 个人的税收居民身份与协定待遇材料归档，两者都影响判断，且都需要时间取证。
  • 对企业销售方，先确认是否已委托境内代理人；若已委托，卷宗里需要的是那份委托，而不是扣缴凭证。

展望

可以预期，第一批争议会集中在履行地，而不是税率——个人服务的税率是清楚的，地理位置不是。也可以预期，把同一项业务拆成一份跨境合同加一笔境内付款的安排会被重点审视。站得住的做法，是在签约当时形成书面记录，而不是在检查时再补。

延伸阅读

  • 《境内单位代扣代缴自然人增值税：外资企业采购个人服务的扣缴流程》（第 502 篇）——境内自然人扣缴机制的完整说明。

来源

  • 国家税务总局四川省税务局·28 号公告附件《境内单位代扣代缴自然人增值税管理办法》条文问答：https://sichuan.chinatax.gov.cn/art/2026/10/9/art_327_1364961.html
  • 国家税务总局法规库·《中华人民共和国增值税法》及实施条例：https://fgk.chinatax.gov.cn/
  • 国家税务总局甘肃省税务局·扣缴申报时限条文问答：http://gansu.chinatax.gov.cn/art/2026/9/10/art_75_476972.html
  • 财政部·政策发布：https://www.mof.gov.cn/