Italy's Representative Office Visa

[Ancova]

Greetings!

Any of you guys have experience with obtaining a residency via the ROV program in Italy?

The below article has sparked my interest:

https://www.imidaily.com/europe/ita...stment-no-presence-path-to-italian-residency/

 

[SCI]

Just goning through the process with a friend. I have a European passport and my friend an African passport. Our companies are both in Africa.
Relatively easy but loooonnnnnngggg. I did it myself as its a process I wanted to understand.

Nearly finished but my friend with the African passport seemed to get it quicker than I did. He is now applying for his visa and it is very simple once you have your tax office and chamber of commerce documents. Its a lot of documents that need to be translated and notarised by an Italian speaking notary. Don't just use any notary. Plus documents need to be processed through the Italian embassy where your company is registered.

My Italian business partner who helped us said that there is not a quota so it basically open book and the only requirement they mainly look for is a business that is running in another country (you would need to evidence this).

You can not take payments for services in Italy as this goes into a different category of business and is taxable. The company is purely a marketing entity which you must fund from your HQ company. You do not need to file taxes, employ locals and there is no stay/residency element for the visa. Of course it makes sense to pop in regularly.

I think this would be fantastic for anyone looking for easy access to Europe to live.
I would register a company in any other country and take advantage of using an EMI to open a bank account.

Therefore you are not doing business in Italy with your Italian company. But can use your other company to invoice.
Fantastic loophole.
Also if you register another company in Scilly and employ 2 local people. I think you can be tax exempt for upto 10 years. I will have to confirm this after I have finished my set up.

I see this benefiting anyone who wants EU residency. Doesnt really work for other European countries unless you are in a high tax paying country.
A lot of your personal expenses can be covered by your company ie accommodation, communication, and transportation. Salary is subject to tax either in your country of HQ or Italy. I would suggest paying it in Italy. Minimum salary has to be €6K so very acceptable considering the other loopholes. Something I will add to my business as a service in the future for sure.


@Hans Mandel this could be something for your situation possibly.

 

[MaryHM]

SCI said:
Just goning through the process with a friend. I have a European passport and my friend an African passport. Our companies are both in Africa.
Relatively easy but loooonnnnnngggg. I did it myself as its a process I wanted to understand.

Nearly finished but my friend with the African passport seemed to get it quicker than I did. He is now applying for his visa and it is very simple once you have your tax office and chamber of commerce documents. Its a lot of documents that need to be translated and notarised by an Italian speaking notary. Don't just use any notary. Plus documents need to be processed through the Italian embassy where your company is registered.

My Italian business partner who helped us said that there is not a quota so it basically open book and the only requirement they mainly look for is a business that is running in another country (you would need to evidence this).

You can not take payments for services in Italy as this goes into a different category of business and is taxable. The company is purely a marketing entity which you must fund from your HQ company. You do not need to file taxes, employ locals and there is no stay/residency element for the visa. Of course it makes sense to pop in regularly.

I think this would be fantastic for anyone looking for easy access to Europe to live.
I would register a company in any other country and take advantage of using an EMI to open a bank account.

Therefore you are not doing business in Italy with your Italian company. But can use your other company to invoice.
Fantastic loophole.
Also if you register another company in Scilly and employ 2 local people. I think you can be tax exempt for upto 10 years. I will have to confirm this after I have finished my set up.

I see this benefiting anyone who wants EU residency. Doesnt really work for other European countries unless you are in a high tax paying country.
A lot of your personal expenses can be covered by your company ie accommodation, communication, and transportation. Salary is subject to tax either in your country of HQ or Italy. I would suggest paying it in Italy. Minimum salary has to be €6K so very acceptable considering the other loopholes. Something I will add to my business as a service in the future for sure.


@Hans Mandel this could be something for your situation possibly.
Click to expand...

My husband and I are expats living in Panama currently, but just learned about this visa option. An attorney quoted us 12,000 euro just to get to the temporary visa stage, then $2000 a year for the next 5 years to renew the temporary. I feel this is excessive, and am emboldened by you saying you did this yourself! May I ask what kind of fees you're up to at this stage? I'm guessing no where near 12,000 euro....

 

[SCI]

A few mistakes were made but I think we will be each in for about half that. Budget €5K plus an additional €2K as there is 2 of you. So €7K all in just follow the steps I mentioned.

Most importantly your HQ company has to stand up even if it has only been running a year. Bank statements, tax returns and corporate filings. Translated and notarised ideally at the Italian embassy.

 

[MaryHM]

Thank you so much for the information. Greatly appreciated.

 

[SCI]

Good luck

 

[banafinfodafuggiano]

SCI said:
Just goning through the process with a friend. I have a European passport and my friend an African passport. Our companies are both in Africa.
Relatively easy but loooonnnnnngggg. I did it myself as its a process I wanted to understand.

Nearly finished but my friend with the African passport seemed to get it quicker than I did. He is now applying for his visa and it is very simple once you have your tax office and chamber of commerce documents. Its a lot of documents that need to be translated and notarised by an Italian speaking notary. Don't just use any notary. Plus documents need to be processed through the Italian embassy where your company is registered.

My Italian business partner who helped us said that there is not a quota so it basically open book and the only requirement they mainly look for is a business that is running in another country (you would need to evidence this).

You can not take payments for services in Italy as this goes into a different category of business and is taxable. The company is purely a marketing entity which you must fund from your HQ company. You do not need to file taxes, employ locals and there is no stay/residency element for the visa. Of course it makes sense to pop in regularly.

I think this would be fantastic for anyone looking for easy access to Europe to live.
I would register a company in any other country and take advantage of using an EMI to open a bank account.

Therefore you are not doing business in Italy with your Italian company. But can use your other company to invoice.
Fantastic loophole.
Also if you register another company in Scilly and employ 2 local people. I think you can be tax exempt for upto 10 years. I will have to confirm this after I have finished my set up.

I see this benefiting anyone who wants EU residency. Doesnt really work for other European countries unless you are in a high tax paying country.
A lot of your personal expenses can be covered by your company ie accommodation, communication, and transportation. Salary is subject to tax either in your country of HQ or Italy. I would suggest paying it in Italy. Minimum salary has to be €6K so very acceptable considering the other loopholes. Something I will add to my business as a service in the future for sure.


@Hans Mandel this could be something for your situation possibly.
Click to expand...

So are you saying we can live in Italy and pay no taxes?

Will that work even if we are EU citizens ?

 

[oldtimer2]

As a quick google search will show, there are several articles online about setting up a Representative Office in Italy. They typically say you need an Italian accountant or notary to register the RO and to then apply for the nulla osta. The accountant submits the papers on behalf of the RO for the RO to apply for a Certificate of No Impediment and a nulla osta for a foreign non-eu national to be able to apply for a visa to go to Italy as the official representative working in the RO. So it seems professional assistance in Italy is required for the first steps. (Registering the RO, obtaining Certificate of No Impediment, submitting documents on behalf of the RO so it can apply for and obtain the nulla osta and perhaps other steps as well that can only be done by a rep already within Italy.)

In the online articles you will find conflicting information about the number of documents you require to be able to open the RO, and about what visa the non-eu national must apply for.

Most articles say the visa is for an intra-company transfer.

Nicolo Bolla raises the option of a self employed visa and in the case of it being for the representative of the RO it in this specific case falls outside the quota that normally applies to self employed visas.

I have directly confirmed from my local Italian embassy that yes the self employed visa is eligible when the nulla osta is obtained through a RO, and yes it falls outside the annual quota flow. So that's very good news.

Since the self employed visa approach is for self employed, that means the contract appointing that person as the Representative must state they can work without supervision (i.e. as a self employed agent so to speak) and they _cannot_ be an employee who must report back to the HQ and be supervised directly by HQ.

As for paying zero tax, this might be possible depending on your types of income and sources, but to renew the self employed visa you need to show for a single person about 6.5k euros income FROM ANY SOURCE and pay tax and social charges on that minimum amount. (About 8.5k euros minimum if there is a dependent spouse.)

That raise the question... how to pay tax and social charges if you are claiming a 0% tax regime and if all your income falls into eligibility for the 0% regime?

Nicolo Bolla says you _must_ pay the tax and socials on that minimum amount to be able to renew the self employed residency permit.

Now, when lawyers say you "must", sometimes it only means its going to be much easier to renew the residency permit if you do that... and other times they really mean you must or you simply cannot renew the permit. I don't know which category of 'must' this minimum income and payment of tax and social charges falls into.

Also, Nicolo, (as the OP says) claims there is no minimum annual stay required to renew the permit. This is worth checking deeper because the normal requirement to renew the self employed residency permit _does_ have a minimum stay requirement.

Also on the subject of what you _must_ do... some online articles say there must be more documents supplied to open a RO etc than those listed in other articles.

So far, some lawyers have told me you do not need to provide company financials at all. My local Italian embassy also did not ask for company financials in their list of required documents to open a RO.

In the end, you might find you can supply less documents if registering your RO in one prefecture and more documents might be required in a different prefecture. Perhaps a company in Africa might face a higher hurdle to register their RO than a company from a more western country. In any case, Nicolo says company financials must be supplied when applying to register the RO, but other lawyers and my local Italy embassy do not include financials in the list.

So, like a lot of 'advice' from Italian sources about Italian residency options, the information obtainable from free online sources does vary a lot and each 'lawyer' or accountant tends to just ask for and do what works for them in their prefecture/s where they work. Other routes and options will also probably work since other lawyers specifically recommend different models to reach the same ROV destination.

To summarise:
Certainly there seems to be a simple enough process to register an RO in Italy (in fact it seems a simple route in many countries not just Italy ).

It seems like there are at least 2 options for the visa to enter Italy. Both the self employed visa and the Intra-company Transfer (ICT) visa are eligible- NOTE: there are actually 2 different types of ICT visa in Italy (the EU version and the national version both with different issues) so care must be taken choosing which one to apply for if you go the ICT visa route).

The good news is both visa route options fall outside any quote restrictions when the nulla osta is applied for through the RO.

The self employed route is a much easier process to qualify and to renew the residency permit. The self employed permit can lead to permanent residency (presumably if the minimum stay in Italy and minimum tax and social payments each year are met). The ICT residency generally does not lead to permanent residency and might also not be renewable beyond a certain number of years. It's a much more complicated process.

In his online article PERHAPS Nicolo tends to necessarily gloss over some issues such as being able to apply for permanent residency. His article seems to suggest you do not need to satisfy any stay requirements to either renew the residency permit OR to apply for permanent residency... but those details should be double checked for confirmation. It's possible Nicolo is just mixing together various possibilities but due to the shortness of the article he cannot provide deeper text about exactly the requirements to satisfy either goal. Or maybe he knows his subject perfectly and what we read in his article is in fact correct. You would want to get the green light from some offical source any way. To put this another way:
You really should double check with office source/s if you can pay no tax and renew the residency permit.
You really should double check with official sources if you can apply to renew the residency permit and eventually apply for permanent residency after 5 years IF you do not spend the minimum stay each year in Italy. (As I said above, if you go the ICT visa route then it will NOT lead to permanent residency. The self employed visa can lead to permanent residency but does the RO route wave a magic wand and remove the normal requirements for annual stay?

If I was going the RO route through Nicolo or any other accountant or lawyer specifically promoting this model then I would ask for contacts details for their other clients who have gone this route with them and check with them that everything works as advertised 🙂. The ideal reference would be from a client who has gone all the way through 5 years and obtained their permanent residency according to the advertised model.

One other comment about the self employed visa route via a RO... self employed pay less social taxes and can enjoy 5% tax for 5 years then 15% after that on only 78% (maybe less) of their total revenue - this is a standard taxation model up to I think now 85k euro annual income and is not some special tax regime like Impatriate. It's not a bad tax rate.

 

[SCI]

Taxes are due because you must pay yourself or the representative a minimum of €6000 per year. You work for the Representative Office so any other income you should optimise/structure. As its still in the EU then either pay tax in your home country or in Italy.

That clarity I have not sort yet and I am playing ignorance for now. As an EU citizen I am liable for tax at my place of effective residency which is Andorra eventhough I live in Spain . There are more optimal options like Malta but I'm not intending is staying in Spain for much longer.

I simply went through the process so I could understand it as I have a lot of clients who are looking for a way to live in Europe. Whilst still running companies outside of the EU. Some just want to get out and not have to go through the Golden Visa route.

 

[wellington]

SCI said:
Just goning through the process with a friend. I have a European passport and my friend an African passport. Our companies are both in Africa.
Relatively easy but loooonnnnnngggg. I did it myself as its a process I wanted to understand.

Nearly finished but my friend with the African passport seemed to get it quicker than I did. He is now applying for his visa and it is very simple once you have your tax office and chamber of commerce documents. Its a lot of documents that need to be translated and notarised by an Italian speaking notary. Don't just use any notary. Plus documents need to be processed through the Italian embassy where your company is registered.

My Italian business partner who helped us said that there is not a quota so it basically open book and the only requirement they mainly look for is a business that is running in another country (you would need to evidence this).

You can not take payments for services in Italy as this goes into a different category of business and is taxable. The company is purely a marketing entity which you must fund from your HQ company. You do not need to file taxes, employ locals and there is no stay/residency element for the visa. Of course it makes sense to pop in regularly.

I think this would be fantastic for anyone looking for easy access to Europe to live.
I would register a company in any other country and take advantage of using an EMI to open a bank account.

Therefore you are not doing business in Italy with your Italian company. But can use your other company to invoice.
Fantastic loophole.
Also if you register another company in Scilly and employ 2 local people. I think you can be tax exempt for upto 10 years. I will have to confirm this after I have finished my set up.

I see this benefiting anyone who wants EU residency. Doesnt really work for other European countries unless you are in a high tax paying country.
A lot of your personal expenses can be covered by your company ie accommodation, communication, and transportation. Salary is subject to tax either in your country of HQ or Italy. I would suggest paying it in Italy. Minimum salary has to be €6K so very acceptable considering the other loopholes. Something I will add to my business as a service in the future for sure.


@Hans Mandel this could be something for your situation possibly.
Click to expand...

Got a link to your agent/representation? (who is carrying out the application process).

 

[oldtimer2]

SCI said:
Taxes are due because you must pay yourself or the representative a minimum of €6000 per year. You work for the Representative Office so any other income you should optimise/structure. As its still in the EU then either pay tax in your home country or in Italy.

That clarity I have not sort yet and I am playing ignorance for now. As an EU citizen I am liable for tax at my place of effective residency which is Andorra eventhough I live in Spain . There are more optimal options like Malta but I'm not intending is staying in Spain for much longer.

I simply went through the process so I could understand it as I have a lot of clients who are looking for a way to live in Europe. Whilst still running companies outside of the EU. Some just want to get out and not have to go through the Golden Visa route.
Click to expand...

I think the tax side can be sorted out with some care... and I think from all reports and all my enquiries generally the RO and ROV model works well to get the residency permit in Italy.

I think the important and interesting short term questions are these:
1. Does the RO model enable people to spend less than 183 days in Italy and still be able to renew the residency permit?
The standard renewal rules say 'no'. However, since Representatives might be required to travel a lot outside Italy in their official duties, therefore PERHAPS the RO model might remove the minimum length of stay rule to be able to renew the permit. If it does remove the minimum stay obligation, then this becomes a simple route to spend up to ~180 days in Italy in one stay (not 90/180 stays). Taxes could be optimised inside and outside of Italy. The foreign HQ just needs to maintain reasonable good substance in the home country to escape any possible application of the Italian CFC rules. (Just another angle to check. Like most western countries, Italy has many and complicated tax arrangements as we all know... and so the usual wider due diligence will need to be performed).
2.If the answer to question 1 happens to be yes, than after 5 years (that includes 1,2,3,4 or 5 years with less than 183 day stays), can the permanent residency be obtained? (If yes, then this would go against all standard EU country rules about obtaining permanent residency through length of stay. Naturally, many people would be strongly interested in Italian permanent residency if all they have to do is open a RO and pay tax and social on 6.5k / 8.5k euros per year with no minimum stay in Italy requirement each year. It sounds too good to be true 🙂. )

Anybody interested to ask Nicolo Bolla those 2 questions, and post his replies here in this thread? Make sure to get the references to the relevant law that says it's ok. 🙂

To fantasise... (and if we put aside how to satisfy tax residency issues in another country like Andorra) then one years travel could be:
182 days in Italy perhaps in one stay ( - better to be in the second half of the year to minimise tax risks)
plus 2 visits anywhere else in Schengen ( 2 x 90/180 )
or do 60 days in Cyprus for tax residency there
.The options seem very interesting 🙂.

Ancova said:
Greetings!

Any of you guys have experience with obtaining a residency via the ROV program in Italy?

The below article has sparked my interest:

https://www.imidaily.com/europe/ita...stment-no-presence-path-to-italian-residency/
Click to expand...

Nicolo will answer some questions for free (before he starts asking for fees). So you should be able to send him a couple of clear questions like:
Dear Nicolo,
1. does the RO model remove the minimum stay requirements to renew the residency permit?, and
2. after 5 years does the RO model allow you to apply for permanent residency even if no minimum stays were made during the 5 years?
and please tell me the tax law or rules that allow these exceptions.

Last edited: Sep 11, 2023

 

[SCI]

wellington said:
Got a link to your agent/representation? (who is carrying out the application process).
Click to expand...

I literally went through the process myself. I have some business interest in Italy from a company I do a lot of consulting for.

My business partner just asked one of his legal admins who speaks good English to assist me.

There are plenty of guys online but as this is something I wanted to understand I dived in head first but came out with just a few scratches.

I anticipate by end of this month I should be done.

From what I understand the stay requirements are minimal for renewal. As I don't require residency it'd not something for me. I did enquire if it would be possible to gain permanent residency and from what I have been told it would require tax compliance and an average stay (I assume 50% of the 5 years).

 

[oldtimer2]

SCI said:
I literally went through the process myself. I have some business interest in Italy from a company I do a lot of consulting for.

My business partner just asked one of his legal admins who speaks good English to assist me.

There are plenty of guys online but as this is something I wanted to understand I dived in head first but came out with just a few scratches.

I anticipate by end of this month I should be done.

From what I understand the stay requirements are minimal for renewal. As I don't require residency it'd not something for me. I did enquire if it would be possible to gain permanent residency and from what I have been told it would require tax compliance and an average stay (I assume 50% of the 5 years).
Click to expand...

Thanks for sharing your comments. Online articles suggest you _must_ have an accountant or lawyer In Italy who your company appoints as its authorised representative in Italy. This first representative then submits the documents to register the RO. That first company representative also applies for the Certificate of No Impediment and then the nulla osta for the foreigner who will apply for the ROV at their embassy and eventually go to Italy to work as the manager / representative in the RO. Did you need to use a lawyer or accountant in Italy for those first steps? If not, did your business partners legal admin do these steps for you? Or did you use anybody in Italy? Thanks!

 

[DomFox]

SCI said:
A few mistakes were made but I think we will be each in for about half that. Budget €5K plus an additional €2K as there is 2 of you. So €7K all in just follow the steps I mentioned.

Most importantly your HQ company has to stand up even if it has only been running a year. Bank statements, tax returns and corporate filings. Translated and notarised ideally at the Italian embassy.
Click to expand...

Hi. Thanks for thus really useful info. How much do you think it will cost to renew each year? Also, can you share the accountant you used? Thanks. Dominic

 

[SCI]

DomFox said:
Hi. Thanks for thus really useful info. How much do you think it will cost to renew each year? Also, can you share the accountant you used? Thanks. Dominic
Click to expand...

Renewal I expect about €2K. I did it myself with help from my business partner but have not completed the process.

 

[DomFox]

Brilliant! Thanks for your help